Tabitha Turner Allegedly Pepper-Sprayed During Uber Ride
Atlanta Sportscaster Tabitha Turner Allegedly Pepper-Sprayed During Uber Ride
Tabitha Turner, a sports analyst for the Atlanta Hawks and Atlanta Dream, was allegedly pepper-sprayed and physically assaulted by an Uber driver last weekend.
According to NBC News, Uber driver Mericole Smith picked up Tabitha Turner from Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport last Saturday. Turner says she ordered an Uber Comfort, which allows passengers to ask for a specific temperature in the car or even request a no talking ride. The conflict allegedly began when Turner requested Smith to turn up the air conditioning.
“The driver did not respond verbally, but she did put the air conditioner on, but she did not roll the windows up. And so as the ride went on, the vehicle obviously did not cool off,” Miguel Dominguez, the attorney for Tabitha Turner, told reporters.
“My client was really hot, she was sweaty, she addressed the driver again, asking that the windows be rolled up. The response she got from the driver was not kind and was not friendly. The driver was clearly irritated by, I guess, the demands of a passenger.”
After Turner inquired once more about the air conditioning, Smith pulled the car over onto the emergency lane of Interstate 85 and asked Turner to exit the car. Turner said she would if Smith called the police and refunded her money. At this point, Smith and Turner have divergent accounts of what occurred next.
Dominguez has said that Turner remained calm throughout the argument and that Smith escalated the conflict. A 30-second clip shared by Tabitha Turner shows her arguing with Smith when Smith apparently begins pepper-spraying Turner. Turner alleges that Smith tried to physically remove her from the car and began hitting her.
Smith uploaded a TikTok that went viral, giving a different account of the events.
From NBC News:
In her TikTok video, Smith says she turned the air conditioner up after Turner commented about how hot the car was. However, she says she does not roll up the windows because she sometimes has passengers who are sick. Smith says the windows were only slightly cracked.
According to Smith, Turner started yelling at her, so she told Turner that she would take her back to the airport and end the trip.
“That was not good enough for her,” Smith says in her video. “She is going off. She is irate in the back seat, tripping, so I pull over. I’m like, actually, yeah, I’m going to need you to get out right here. So I pull over in Hapeville, we’re off the highway.”
In the video, Smith says she told Turner that Uber would refund her but that Turner refused to leave. Because the situation was escalating, Smith flagged down a passerby and asked that they call 911.
Tabitha Turner says that she has received harassment as a result of Smith’s video, and people have even gone so far as to harass her employers as well. “I have opportunities with the league that I don’t know if are going to happen now because of what she’s saying. People questioning my character because of what she’s saying,” Turner told reporters.
“Pulling over on the expressway with cars speeding by, telling me to get out with my bags—it’s not a reasonable request. I have a one-year-old daughter I like to take to games with me. Now I can’t, because I don’t know who’s going to be there to attack me based on what she’s saying.”
Police determined Smith to be the aggressor after reviewing Tabitha Turner’s video as well as taking into account a statement made by a motorist who witnessed the altercation. A warrant was issued for Smith’s arrest, and she faces misdemeanor charges of battery and simple battery.
While I generally don’t like automation, I’ve seen way too many stories of passengers being allegedly assaulted by Uber drivers and vice versa, so I completely understand why people would prefer driverless taxis. I know more and more people using Waymo, Google’s driverless taxi service, specifically because they want to avoid a situation like the one Tabitha Turner found herself in.
It’s genuinely sad that this all went down over some air conditioning.
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