Yesterday, ride-hailing app Grab released a statement on their driver-partner who was killed last Thursday night in an alleged carjacking incident.
https://www.facebook.com/GrabPH/photos/a.604837229572623.1073741840.527357467320600/1633464926709843/?type=3&theater
In the statement, Grab said they will now ask passengers for IDs to confirm their identity before starting the ride and to avoid the possibility of passengers booking rides with fake profiles.
The driver, Gerardo Maquidato Jr., a father of four children, was shot and pushed out of the Toyota Innova he was driving by people who pretended to be passengers, ABS-CBN News reported.
According to Rogelio Hernandez, the chief investigator of the Pasay City Police, Maquidato was on Bonanza St. in Pasay City when the incident happened.
According to a report in the Manila Bulletin, the victim was shot in the back of the head.
An anonymous witness saw the driver being pushed out of the car but did not see the gunman’s face because the car drove away from the scene.
Grab said in the statement that they are working with police to find out who killed Maquidato.
During an interview with radio station DZMM this morning, Grab spokesperson Leo Gonzales said that they’ve already sent an incident report to the Land and Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board that includes information on the last few people that booked Maquidato’s service.
Gonzales also said that they have set up a reward worth PHP100,000 (US$2,000) for anyone who can give them information on the perpetrators.
Last year, Grab presented Maquidato with an award after he gave a free ride to a sick passenger on her way to pick up bags of blood for a dialysis. The passenger’s sister, Divine Lactao Ornum, shared Maquidato’s heroism on Facebook.
https://www.facebook.com/donnadivine.lactao/posts/10213700261882198
“Kuya Gerardo, my sister cried from happiness, she told me to post this [earlier] but I always forgot…Thank you very much, even in the last few moment’s of my sister’s life, you were able to make her happy in some way. (My sister passed away this afternoon Aug. 22),” Ornum said in Filipino in a post from last year.
