According to the lawsuit filed in Los Angles Superior Court, the plaintiff, who is identified as a “Chinese professor,” alleges the Lyft driver picked her up in the Mid-Wilshire district in 2015 and drove her to Baldwin Park, where he sexually assaulted her.
The suit alleges assault, battery, false imprisonment, negligent hiring and retention and both intentional and negligent infliction of emotional distress. The plaintiff is seeking unspecified damages.
A Lyft representative did not immediately reply to a request for comment.
According to her court papers, the woman said she ordered a ride from Lyft on Jan. 28, 2015, and her intended destination was her home in Westwood. However, after she got into the vehicle, the Lyft driver locked the passenger
doors internally, secured the windows and “told plaintiff that he intended to have sex with her,” according to the complaint.
“Plaintiff begged for her life and demanded defendant take her home, which was the opposite direction on the 10 (Santa Monica) Freeway,” the suit states.
The woman was driven to an isolated field in Baldwin Park near the San Bernardino (10) Freeway, where the driver “sexually assaulted and battered plaintiff,” the suit alleges.
After the attack, the driver drove the woman “to a public location where she ran for her life and summoned police,” the suit states.
The suit alleges Lyft negligently hired, supervised and maintained the driver, who is identified in the complaint only as “Marvin Doe.”
