Photo: Tero Vesalainen / Shutterstock
Stay safe out there.
By Dan O'Reilly — Written on Feb 09, 2022
As the world has become more interconnected and with the wide availability of smartphones, many services have risen to meet the demands of this new, digitally connected world.
Among those services are vehicle-for-hire apps from companies like Lyft and Uber.
While such ride-for-hire services are often very convenient, it’s very important to remember that you’re putting your safety in someone else’s hands every time you get into an Uber or Lyft alone.
One woman was unfortunately faced with that reality.
A viral Instagram post claims that a woman was chased and nearly kidnapped while in a Lyft.
In the Instagram post, user @sofakinglegendari shares a story from one of his friends along with screenshots that detail a scary incident in which she was almost kidnapped while getting a Lyft ride.
The post is a reiteration of a message that the friend sent them about the incident. In the post, the friend says that she found herself in need of a ride home from a friend’s place at 1:00 am.
Not wanting to be a bother, she declined an offer from one of her friends in favor of hailing a Lyft since she lived close by. Little did the friend know, that this decision set in motion a series of events that would nearly result in her getting kidnapped.
When the friend got into the Lyft, all seemed normal for about two blocks, then the car stopped.
In complete silence, the driver of the Lyft, currently known only as “Mohammed,” stopped the car and began looking at his passenger in the mirror.
That was when the woman felt that something was wrong.
“I text my friend and ask her if she’s up she responds yes quickly. I then ask the driver why he stops and he says ‘Oh Nothing’ I say again ‘why did you stop?’ He doesn’t respond but I see him looking at me in the mirror,” the post reads.
The woman then alleges that the whole situation suddenly became a scene straight out of a horror movie as a white van quickly pulled up ahead of the Lyft car. Thankfully, she has a far better survival instinct than the average horror movie character and she decides that she’s got to go.
The woman fled the Lyft and van on foot.
The alleged victim describes her harrowing flight from the car, saying, “At that point I decide that I have to run I pull the lock and the door handle at the same time and shove the door. I start running the van begins chasing after me.”
After escaping the car the friend is forced to double back and run down another block before finding refuge behind a jeep and some snow. The victim also managed to call her friend who then came down to rescue her.
The victim hasn’t been able to file a police report because Lyft doesn’t report the license plates to customers.
Lyft, for their part has reportedly begun to investigate the claims, saying in a statement, “We’re in touch with the rider to offer support and have deactivated the driver’s account while we investigate internally.”
Dan O'Reilly is a writer who covers news, politics, and social justice. Follow him on Twitter.