How brazen are Capitol Hill muggers getting? Even taxi cab drivers are getting into the act, a woman who claimed she was robbed after a night partying on Capitol Hill told police.
According to the Seattle Police Department’s report on the March 22 incident, the woman told police she had ridden with the cab driver from her downtown hotel to Pike/Pine while her “friend/roommate” stayed behind. The driver, the woman said, gave her his phone number and told her to call him when she needed a ride back to the Westin from The Comet where he dropped her off sometime around 9 PM. On the drive back down the Hill, the woman noticed it was taking longer than she remembered to get back to the hotel, she told police. According to the report, the woman said when she confronted the driver, he began to yell and pulled the cab over:
“YOU’RE GONNA GET CASH OUT OF THE ATM!” SHEREPLIED “WHAT?”, WHEREUPON HE WENT TO HER DOOR, OPENED IT, DRAGGED HER OUT BY HER HAIR AND THREW HER ON THE GROUND. HE TOLD HER THAT SHE WAS GOING TO GET MONEY OUT OF THE CASH MACHINE AND GIVE IT TO HIM.
The driver was stopped in front of the Washington Mutual ATM near the Harvard Square QFC, according to the report. The woman said she withdrew $200 from the ATM using a card belonging to her “friend/roommate” and complied with the driver’s orders and got back in the cab.
The woman said the driver then drove a short distance before stopping the car, getting out and giving the car to another man to drive the woman back to her hotel.
According to the report, the woman returned to her room, told her friend/roommate what had happened, slept, woke, had lunch and then asked Westin staff for their hotel room to be comped because of the robbery. When the Westin’s security director asked her why she hadn’t yet contacted police, the woman told him she’d been “too traumatized.”
The woman finally called policed around 3:30 PM that afternoon. The woman showed the responding officer her torn clothing and some scrapes she said were from when the cab driver threw her to the ground. She decline medical attention for her injuries, the report notes.
According to the report, the cab driver did not appear in any of the security recordings reviewed and could not be identified. The collected evidence was provided to detectives to continue the investigation.
But they’re going to trace the phone number of the driver, right? Because she would have used it to get the ride home from the Comet. I’m usually the most gullible, trusting person, but this story sounds like a scam. It can’t just be me, right?
sure sounds awful!!
i hope she was able to have her meal comped and perhaps a new outfit from H&M comped as well….i mean, after all, she WAS mugged by a cab that still managed to drop her off at her hotel….
Dont worry my little sheltered cherry cheeked princess, of course SPD will fully investigate and prosecute this horrible incident that happened to such a lovely citizen and fellow human being from mother earths ever supplying bosom. And once the phone number is tracked and tapped and SPD identifies this horrible mugger/cabbie/part time cook at Queen of Sheba as a grandmaster for the Taliban, the FBI will be summoned and arrests will be made and flowers will bloom and goats will be slaughtered and the people will rejoice and that crack head who made the false report and drank too many PBR’s at The Comet will smile her meth tooth smile and all will be good. You see my little clove of love, believe in the system and sip on your sweet machiato and scream at non-vegan trash because you can rely on the community and trust everyone and everything they wanna tell you. Now, might I borrow your iPhone for a second and make a quick call to my mother to let her know I forgot to pick up bread and eggs on my way home today? I promise it’s a local call and it will only take me a minute. :)
I hope that this person is charged with filing a false police report. The whole story is ridiculously implausible.
What really happened? My guess is the woman withdrew, without her “friend/roommate”‘s permission, $200 and spent it on booze / drugs / hot dogs. She tripped on her spindly little heels while rushing into the street to barf, made her way back to the hotel room at some point, and made up this stupid story to explain why she had withdrawn money that didn’t belong to her.
Exactly. And what a LAME excuse for a story. Even if she doesn’t get in trouble for this, she’ll get what’s coming for her eventually (probably in the form of being hit by a taxi while drunk in the street…not that I’m wishing bad karma on her though).
I was actually thinking it was invented to get out of paying the hotel bill/get the room comped. Just how is the Westin responsible for her being robbed, if she actually was?
Well thank you kind sir, I *am* cherry-cheeked! I know, I know, it’s got to be a big lie, but I feel badly for most folks in the news who get their lives picked apart by the general public so I always try to give benefit of doubt. I asked about the phone call getting traced because it would of course immediately prove it was a scam when phone records showed otherwise. She obviously didn’t plan her scam (to get hotel comps) or poor decision (drugs/booze/lusty lady on roomie’s dime) very well, though.
“On the drive back down the Hill, the woman noticed it was taking longer than she remembered to get back to the hotel…
“The driver was stopped in front of the Washington Mutual ATM near the Harvard Square QFC, according to the report. The woman said she withdrew $200 from the ATM using a card belonging to her ‘friend/roommate’ and complied with the driver’s orders and got back in the cab….”
On the drive back down the Hill, to the ATM right around the corner from the Comet? You know, a block away? Not much of a drive “back down the Hill.”
I was going to say the exact same thing until I read your post. That’s EXACTLY what happened.