LIGHTHOUSE POINT, Fla. (WSVN) — A man attacked an Uber driver over a fender bender in Lighthouse Point, and the victim showed 7News the damage left behind on his car.
Minor crashes are some things that are almost inevitable with the way traffic is on the road. However, Uber driver Giovanny Jean said the way the other man acted after this accident was very shocking.
Jean reenacted the scene after the minor crash Tuesday in Lighthouse Point as he got in his car.
“So I’m like this, and then he starts hitting the door and punching the window and kicking the door,” Jean said.
The Uber driver was headed south along U.S. 1 in Lighthouse Point and in between fares when he and the driver of a Honda Accord, 39-year-old Thiago Novaes, sideswiped each other.
“He gets out of his car, I get out my car, we inspect the damage, and I say, ‘OK, since we’re in right side, let’s pull over,'” Jean said.
Something about what he said didn’t sit well with Novaes.
“He puts his body on my car door, so I can’t open it for me to go in,” Jean said. “He’s just saying, ‘Nah, you’re not leaving. You’re not leaving,’ and I’m like, ‘Dude, I’m not leaving. Let’s go to the right,’ so he throws a punch and just starts trying to beat on me.”
Jean said he managed to get into his car, but the struggle wasn’t over yet.
“I finally get it open, and I’m pushing him off at the same time, I get into the door, sit down. He’s first throwing kicks at me, into my car at me, into my stomach and chest,” Jean said. “Then he starts punching the window and throwing kicks at the door and dents my door completely.”
He then drove around the corner, and both men were on the phone with dispatchers. Novaes was then taken to jail.
Novaes faced a judge in court and bonded out of jail Wednesday night.
He didn’t want to comment on the arrest.
Jean said that as an Uber driver, he’s seen his fair share of aggressive drivers. “That really didn’t surprise me. It didn’t ruin my day,” Jean said.
Novaes faces charges of simple battery, criminal mischief and burglary because, police said, he reached into Jean’s car.
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