Hailing a taxi cab is still the safest mode of transportation if renting a car is not an option. Ride share customers risk being raped, assaulted or killed by drivers.
Criminals who have their own transportation are turning to driving for ride share companies to hunt for easy targets.
San Mateo police arrested Uber driver Jackie Gordon Wilson and charged him with residential burglary after he dropped off a passenger at the airport then doubled back to the customer’s home to burglarize it.
Police say Wilson committed 2 burglaries in the same neighborhood after dropping off passengers at the airport on Thursday, April 4.
A Ring surveillance camera caught Wilson on video during the commission of the crime at a home in Rancho Cordova, a suburb of Sacramento, California.
The San Mateo Police responded to a call about a burglary in progress at a home on the 1700 block of Nash Drive. When officers arrived, the burglar was gone and the house was ransacked.
The homeowner quickly learned from other Ring community users that the same thing happened to a homeowner on Rand Street who was dropped off at the airport. The Ring camera at the home showed Wilson attempting to burglarize the house but he was scared away when the burglar alarm sounded.
When Wilson was arrested he was wearing the same clothes he had on while lurking around the neighborhood. He was booked into the San Mateo County Jail.
Police in multiple jurisdictions have intensified their efforts to keep ride share customers safe after a 21-year-old college student was murdered by a man pretending to be an Uber driver.
Samantha Josephson, a student at the University of South Carolina, was seen on surveillance video getting into a car driven by 24-year-old Nathaniel Rowland on Friday, March 29. Josephson, a native of New Jersey, left a bar after drinking with friends around 2 a.m. in Columbia’s Five Points area.
Rowland allegedly stabbed Josephson multiple times and dumped her body in a wooded area near his rural home about 65 miles from Columbia, police say.
Rowland activated the child car locks in his vehicle so Josephson could not escape. He was charged with kidnapping and murder.
