MIAMI – A 30-year-old man faces multiple felony charges after state troopers accused him of carjacking an Uber driver and then stranding him on Interstate 195 in Miami early Monday evening.
According to a Florida Highway Patrol arrest report, the victim told troopers that he picked up Rafael Dos Santo Barbosa, a Brazilian national who resides in Marina Del Rey, California, from Mount Sinai Medical Center.
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Miami-Dade Fire Rescue had taken a “disoriented” Dos Santo Barbosa to Mount Sinai earlier that day after receiving a sick person call, Surfside police told troopers.
According to the report, as they drove on I-195 just before 5:30 p.m., Dos Santo Barbosa ordered the Uber driver to stop his SUV and hit him with an umbrella.
The driver, “in fear for his life”, stopped on the westbound ramp leading to northbound Interstate 95, troopers said.
Troopers said Dos Santo Barbosa then took the wheel and left his driver stranded in the “dangerous,” busy area, also taking his cellphone.
A friend of Dos Santo Barbosa’s called police to a home in northeast Miami-Dade after seeing him pull up in the blue Hyundai Tucson, which she found suspicious, the report states.
Dos Santo Barbosa faces charges of carjacking, aggravated battery, second-degree armed grand theft and third-degree grand theft.
He was being held in the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center without bond and on an immigration hold.