She told officers she was raped, robbed by Lyft driver in Miami Beach hotel, cops say
A Lyft driver is facing charges, including sexual battery on an incapacitated person and grand theft, after a woman told officers that he raped her and stole her money inside her Eden Roc Miami Beach hotel room, according to a police report.
Samuel Bucevschi, 35, of Coconut Creek, was being held Tuesday in Miami-Dade County’s Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center on a $520,000 bond.
“Safety is fundamental to Lyft,” a company spokesperson said in a statement. “What is being described is horrifying and the driver’s access to Lyft has been permanently removed. We have reached out to the rider to offer our support and reached out to law enforcement to offer our assistance with their investigation.”
Bucevschi is the second Lyft driver to be arrested by Miami Beach police in about a week on charges of sexual battery on a helpless person. Kevyn Rojas, 26, of Miami was arrested March 2 after a Texas woman told police she had been raped by her Lyft driver, authorities said.
In the case involving Bucevschi, police say the woman, who was not identified, reported that she was raped on Feb. 10 in her hotel room.
She told police that she remembered taking a Lyft ride to a bar on Washington Avenue at about 1 a.m. and remembered the driver giving her his cell phone number, according to a police report. Drinking at the bar was her “last memory,” before she woke up alone and naked in her hotel room at about 10 a.m., the officer said in the report.
She then noticed that her cell phone and $500 in cash were missing, and went to the lobby for help, police said.
She handed over her Lyft records and cell phone information to police, according to the report. Her Lyft history showed that there were several ride requests that she never authorized, with charges totaling nearly $300.
Police then obtained surveillance video, which showed Bucevschi carrying the woman in to the hotel at about 4:30 a.m., the report said. He also went to the front desk with her to get a new key.
The video then shows him going into the elevator with her and then enter her room, police said. Bucevschi leaves the room at around 5:30 a.m. alone, police said. The video shows him with two cell phones, an officer wrote in the report.
Bucevschi was spotted driving in Miami Beach on Monday and was stopped by officers, police said.
He told police that the woman accusing him was “acting strange” and that she made sexual advances toward him, according to the report. After being told that a video exists, Bucevschi told police that he carried her, got the key from the front desk, and brought her to her room but that “nothing happened,” the report said. He refused to give a DNA sample, police said.
“Surveillance video was a critical component to this investigation,” said Ernesto Rodriguez, a spokesman for Miami Beach police.
Rodriguez added, “Unfortunately, you need to always have in the back of your mind that there are always predators out there who are looking for their next victim.”
