A young woman in Melbourne has shared the terrifying moment where she claimed she was nearly abducted by her DiDi driver last night.
Yesterday evening, Julie was on her way to a venue in Richmond from Brunswick to meet up with friends for dinner. She ordered a DiDi at 6pm and got in a silver Mazda 3.
However, instead of taking her to Richmond, her driver took her down a series of random “wrong turns” and onto a motorway heading towards Balwyn North. What was meant to be a 15 minute-long trip ended up being over 40 minutes.
“We’re taking some route through Fitzroy, and he takes few wrong turns and he was like, ‘Oh, I’m so sorry, I don’t know what’s happened I’ve made a few mistakes today’, and I’m like, ‘it’s alright, it happens’”, she explained in a series of posts on her Instagram Story last night.
“And then we end up on the motorway and half an hour had gone by and we were still in Fitzroy.”
When Julie continued to remind him they were going in the wrong direction, the driver allegedly offered her to cancel the trip so she won’t get charged. As in, while she was still in the car.
Side note: when someone is taking me in a completely different direction to where I’ve told them to go and then suggests removing our whereabouts from the records (which, correct me if I’m wrong, is essentially what that would do), that’s an extremely red flag. JFC.
“I’m looking at his phone and his maps keep telling him to exit the motorway and he’s in the rightmost lane as well and he stayed in the rightmost lane the whole time,” she continued.
“I feel like there was no intention on his side to ever exit.
40 minutes into this trip, Julie decides to call her sister. “I’m like, ‘I don’t know what the fuck is happening’”, she said.
“I start freaking out because anything I say to him, he can’t give me a clear answer back as to where we’re going… He realises [I’m on the phone with her] and tries to calm me down.
“‘Oh, sister, sister, it’s fine, don’t worry I’ll get you to where you need to go’”, he said, according to her.
“I’m like, ‘what the fuck is happening’, and my sister [says], ‘Julie, you need to get out of the car.’”
Julie believes that he only started to back off and listen to her once he realised she was on the phone with her sister. He eventually pulled over to the side of the motorway when she tried to get out of the car but noticed her door was locked.
“I eventually went over to the other side, got out and he was like trying to get me back into the car. It was so weird, he was saying, ‘here’s my phone, talk to my friends they’ll tell you that you can come with me.’
“It was just terrifying like why the fuck are we on the motorway, what am I doing. I feel like if I didn’t say anything, he would’ve kept driving. He just took advantage of the fact that I didn’t know Melbourne that well and didn’t say anything when he didn’t take all those random turns.”
After the awful incident, her sister picked her up and took her to a nearby police station to make a report. The young woman also contacted the DiDi safety line but they couldn’t help “because the driver was not explicitly aggressive towards [her]”.
In a statement shared with PEDESTRIAN.TV, a spokesperson for DiDi confirmed that the company was aware of the incident and had temporarily suspended the driver upon an investigation into the matter.
“DiDi is aware of an incident that occurred on the platform in Melbourne overnight,” they said.
“The passenger contacted the ride hotline on two separate occasions relating to the matter.
“When there is an incident concerning rider safety, as a precaution we immediately suspend the driver’s access to the app and conduct an investigation, while also assisting law enforcement where required.
“For this particular incident, DiDi has temporarily suspended the driver’s account and is conducting a thorough investigation, which could result in a temporary or permanent suspension of the driver from the DiDi platform, while we will also cooperate with law enforcement in its investigations.”
The DiDi spokesperson added that the company “works closely with our driver-partners to provide education, training, and guidance on safety to ensure each and every member of our community feel comfortable and respected while using DiDi.”
Help is available. If you require immediate assistance or believe your life is in danger, please call 000.
If you’d like to speak to someone about sexual violence, please call the 1800 Respect hotline on 1800 737 732 or chat online.
Under 25? You can reach Kids Helpline at 1800 55 1800 or chat online.
