A rideshare sexual assault perpetrator has been arrested in New Jersey after allegedly attacking a juvenile who had been one of the driver’s passengers.

Thirty-nine-year-old Julio Mejia, a Wharton, N.J. resident, faces charges of sexual assault, endangering the welfare of a child and criminal sexual contact, according to records kept by the Passaic County Prosecutor’s Office. The rideshare driver allegedly assaulted the female juvenile on Aug. 18 and Sept. 24.

NJ.com reports that police have not specified if Mejia committed the crimes while he was working. The name of the rideshare company he represented when he provided rides to the girl has not been disclosed by authorities.

According to the prosecutor’s office, Mejia was an active member of the military at the time of his arrest, but the branch of the military was not identified.

Lyft, Uber Face Lawsuits from Rideshare Sexual Assault Victims

Vice.com wrote in an article last summer that seven women filed rideshare sexual assault lawsuitson Aug. 1, alleging their Lyft drivers either raped or assaulted them. The women were invoiced for the rides despite reporting the assaults to the company.

Four of the seven women say their Lyft drivers raped them. A woman out with friends in New Orleans in January 2019 said a Lyft driver took her to his home where he “raped and sodomized” her.

In San Diego in 2016, friends caught a Lyft driver raping a friend in her own bedroom after she had taken the Lyft home.

At least one law firm in California said more than 100 cases have been filed against Lyft and Uber because of sexual assault allegations.

Uber conducted its own research into fatal crashes, murder and sexual assaults involving the company’s drivers. In statistics released in 2019, Uber said it had received 3,045 reports of sexual assaults in 2018. 

The New York Times spoke with Tony West, chief legal officer at Uber, who told the Times, “The numbers are jarring and hard to digest. What it says is that Uber is a reflection of the society it serves.”

Uber’s report said that in 92 percent of rape cases, the victim was a passenger. In other types of sexual assault, which included unwanted kissing, non-consensual touching of a “sexual body part” and attempted rape, the drivers were victims at about the same rate as passengers.

Both Uber and Lyft have been accused of using cheap background check services that are less expensive – and less complete – than those used by taxicab companies. In 2016, Uber reached a $25 million settlement regarding allegations the company’s background checks allowed 25 criminals to pass the screening because the background checks failed to include a full sweep of criminal history databases or didn’t search as far back into the criminals’ pasts as they should have.

Lyft faced a similar lawsuit regarding incomplete criminal background checks back in 2014.

States have a variety of different laws regarding the type of information available in an employee background check, but some companies are more thorough than others when looking into criminal histories.

Uber reportedly started running daily background checks that the company said resulted in the dismissal of 20,000 drivers from the app last year, reported Vice.com.

This article is not legal advice. It is presented
for informational purposes only.