The case is currently being investigated by the Sør-West police district. The man accused of rape pleads not guilty. He has so far not been appointed a defender. The lawyer for the aggrieved woman in her 40s is strongly critical of the fact that neither the police nor the taxi center have had control over the accused driver in the period after the incident. The police were already in contact with Stavanger Taxi on the same night that the incident allegedly took place. According to news’s knowledge, the exchange gave information about payments and GPS positions of the taxi in question. Managing director Svein Svimbil of Stavanger Taxi did not know about the charges until news contacted them on Friday. Photo: Kaj Hjertenes / news Managing director Svein Svimbil of Stavanger Taxi told news on Friday afternoon that he was not aware that a license associated with their exchange is involved in a rape investigation. – Can be excluded from driving After news made contact on Friday, he began to check the matter with the taxi owner in question. It is a man who drove for the taxi owner who has been charged with rape, and not the taxi owner himself. – The taxi owner told me that he didn’t know about the charge either. But in the end I got hold of him in question, and he confirmed the matter. He also added that he had been called in sick two weeks ago, so at the moment he is not at work in the taxi, says Svimbil. – Will Stavanger Taxi exclude the driver in question from further driving? – This is something we must assess when we have gained full clarity on what has happened. We have ruled out drivers in the past, and that may happen in this case as well, but it is not a decision we want to make until we have more information on the table. I have asked that the accused and the taxi owner meet at my office on Monday morning and we will have to take it from there. Visited the rape reception center According to the welfare lawyer, the woman in her 40s was out on a nice date with friends in Sandnes. She felt she had drunk too much alcohol and wanted to get home to sleep. The woman entered a taxi which drove her in the direction of her destination. But suddenly the driver allegedly stopped and assaulted the passenger in the back seat. Evelyn Egeli says that the client has experienced the time afterwards as highly traumatic. Photo: Ole Andreas Bø / news The woman was eventually released. She managed to get to a friend’s house where she alerted the police. She was then taken to the rape center. The police did not find the driver Police attorney Malin Skeibrok Ånensen says that an arrest warrant was issued for the taxi driver a few hours after the report, but it was not possible to track him down at relevant addresses. The police searched for the driver in the following days without finding him. According to Ånensen, the arrest decision was then concluded, and the driver was then called in for questioning on 31 August – almost four weeks after the incident. – The accused has not pleaded guilty. He has a different explanation for what happened than the victim, says Ånensen. She does not want to go into more detail about what the driver has explained to the police. – Should have been jailed Evelyn Egeli, counsel for the woman who is said to have been raped, believes it is incomprehensible and reprehensible that the police did not make more efforts to find the accused at an earlier time, and that they then did not choose to petition for the driver’s detention. – The rape was very traumatic for my client. She finds it very stressful just to go out in the city and see taxis and drivers. A taxi should be a safe place. Of course, you don’t expect anything so bad to happen there, says Egeli. She believes that the police lost opportunities to trace the driver and the taxi since they did not come into contact with him for almost the whole of August. – What do you think that the manager of the taxi company says that he has not heard about the case? – It is absolutely incredible, as long as the police contacted the taxi center and received information already on the same day that this happened, in early August. The driver should of course never have had the opportunity to drive on, believes Egeli. news does not know whether the accused man actually drove a taxi after the incident. – No risk of tampering with evidence Police prosecutor Malin Skeibrok Ånensen says that the driver was not requested to be detained because the police believed there was no danger of tampering with evidence. According to Ånensen, the police have not investigated whether the accused is still driving a taxi. – What remains of the investigation? – We are still carrying out technical investigations, including the mobile data of the accused and the victim. We are also awaiting the results of biological samples taken on the victim. There are also several interviews remaining in the case, says Ånensen. Another taxi incident Another episode took place two weeks ago in Nord-Jæren. A young woman was at a party on the outskirts of Stavanger. She called for a taxi to be taken home to another part of the city. The driver allegedly groped the woman in several places on her body during the trip, but he finally dropped her off where she lived. According to the Sør-West police district, there is no connection between the cases where two taxi drivers in the Stavanger/Sandnes region have been charged with rape and sexual acts without consent against female passengers, respectively. Photo: Josef Benoni Ness Tveit / news Police attorney Ingvild Anfinsen Sandal says that the police have opened a case based on the woman’s statement. The taxi driver in question has been identified and has been charged in the case. He is charged with sexual activity without consent. Nor has this taxi driver pleaded guilty. – We have questioned both the accused and the victim, as well as secured DNA. The police have requested access to health information, and are now awaiting receipt of this. After that, the case will be fully investigated, and it will then be settled, says Anfinsen Sandal.
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Taxi driver charged with rape – the driver was able to drive on – news Rogaland – Local news, TV and radio
