Grab driver Armando Nigel Yabut was probably expecting a “thank you” when he went out of his way to drop off an iPhone at the house of a passenger who left it in his car on Friday night.
Instead, he was allegedly assaulted and accused of stealing the phone when he got there. Yabut shared the story on his Facebook page yesterday.
“I had already returned home when he called,” Yabut, who lives in Taytay, Rizal, said on his Facebook post in Tagalog. “I had asked him if I could return it the next day, but he said it was an emergency,” he added.
He said the passenger was nice and offered to buy him food, but Yabut declined and decided to drop off the phone in Kamuning, Quezon City, out of “kindness.”
Yabut told DZMM news yesterday that when he got to the house, the passenger’s demeanor changed.
He only identified the passenger by his first name, Simon.
“I won’t forget how he choked me. I was already losing air and only then did he let me go,” Yabut said in Tagalog.
According to GMA News, two police officers responded to the incident and asked Yabut and the passenger to come to the police station. The passenger allegedly declined and said he will just settle the issue with Yabut.
Yabut refused, however, and the passenger got even angrier. The two went to the barangay hall (village hall) instead.
Yabut said the passenger “flipped” the story on him and said that Yabut “stole” his phone.
The passenger said that Yabut didn’t answer his phone’s calls, which he said proves that Yabut wanted to steal it.
“They tried to force me to admit. The passenger wanted me to apologize and promise I wouldn’t come back for him in the morning because of the attack,” Yabut said.
“His female companion said inside the hall that I should just admit ‘because you wouldn’t lose anything, you wouldn’t lose your manhood, if you admit,'” Yabut said.
Yabut got checked for his injuries. A vein ruptured from being punched in the eye, but he is expected to recover from the assault. He plans to file charges against the passenger today.
