Marissa Watts, BSW

My name is Pilar & I attend the University at Albany in NYS. Yesterday, on 4/1/2019, I was assaulted/harrassed by a @lyft driver. I wanted to share this with Twitter because if the University Police Dept. say that nothing can be done, then the world will know who he is.

@ualbany @AlbanyCityHall @AskLyft @politico @ABC @WTEN @13WHAM @CNN @cnni @AlJazeera @voxdotcom @VICE @UASAlbany @UAlbanyNews

Thank you so much for hearing my story. I won’t let the ignorance get to me. I will continue up until I feel like Todd has paid. #ToddTheTickingTimeBomb SHARE THIS IF YOU CAN PLEASE !!

What was the point? But then someone told me NO. Speak to a supervisor. The supervisor had a bit more sympathy and told me to file my statement. I don’t want to continue on this without legal support. I don’t know how to continue and ANY HELP from you guys, I can use !!

I told the two MALE officers everything. For them to come back to my room and basically tell me nothing can be done. & that if Todd had to physically remove me from his property then so be it. That is what those cops told me. I wanted to quit and just give up.

The first thing I did was call 911. Boohoo crying and ALL! I didn’t know how to feel. Just scared and unprotected tbh. The cops told me I needed to be transferred to UPD as this was an on campus matter.

Although there were cars behind and in front of us at the traffic light, not one person thought for a second that they should help. I am 19 years old who weighs a little over 100lbs. I was legit scared for my life. The emotional trauma I’ve been feeling is just like never before.

I got out the vehicle and murmured something like “he buggin’ my nigga.” He starts yelling at me do I know what the black ppl went through to be using that word. I told him I am black! You can’t educate me! I didn’t use the word in the context of nigg*r!

As I stated, the whole time I said I would’ve simply left if he cancelled my ride and we dealt with it as such. He took matters into his own hands to forcefully remove me. I decided it is no longer worth my life to stay in this car. He throws $5 at me for the ride and says GTFO!

I’m just in so much shock, that I couldn’t do anything. At this point, #ToddTheTickingTimeBomb gets back into the car which you can see happening. He starts saying now we’re gonna go on a trip to the police station. Once he makes the right off campus, this was getting too scary.

He’s tryna grab my phone also which is why the video cuts off because on snap when you move your finger from recording it stops. This guy is just going ballistic at this point.

As you can see the video is only 4 seconds because I had JUST hung up and I was on Snapchat when I hung up so that was the camera I used. He broke my purse, he ripped my headphones (yes I still have the wire headphones) and he throws it all on the grass.

At this point I’m just like please cancel this ride, imma just get out. HE GETS OUT THE VEHICLE. My friend I’m on the phone with is just like “bro just hang up and record this man crazy..” Ya’ll, I wouldn’t lie, he legit starts yanking and pulling me out…

My friend who was on the phone was like “Yo why is he buggin’ like that??” and I was just like “listen this man is buggin’ tf out.” I ain’t think he heard me but he did (crying emoji). He turns around and yells THAT’S IT GET THE FUCK OUTTTTT!!