MIAMI – An Uber driver accused by multiple women of drugging, kidnapping and possibly raping them and leaving them at a Miami motel is now facing additional charges after detectives identified another victim, according to an arrest warrant.
Police arrested Danny Maurad-Avecillas, 49, of southwest Miami-Dade, in late February after a California woman visiting Miami said she he kidnapped, raped, drugged and robbed her.
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Soon after, police said two more women came forward and made similar accusations.
According to the latest arrest warrant, police spoke to the latest victim after Maurad-Avecillas volunteered information during a police interview following his capture on Feb. 22.
Police said during that interview, Maurad-Avecillas told them that on Feb. 19, he picked up a woman from Miami’s Wynwood neighborhood “that was being followed by three men” and “offered her a ride” because he believed “they wanted her Apple Watch.”
Maurad-Avecillas told detectives that the woman was “dizzy, crying and incoherent” and said he believed the men were following her and threw the woman’s Apple Watch away “so they would not be able to track her,” the warrant states.
According to the warrant, he then told police that he took the woman to a motel on Southwest Eighth Street and dropped her off, telling investigators that “this is not the first time something like this happen(ed) to him” and that he left the woman his phone number “for when she regained consciousness.”
Police said they reviewed surveillance video from Motel 77, located at 3021 SW Eighth Street, that showed Maurad-Avecillas exiting a Chevrolet Suburban and “dragging” a woman in a pink dress.
He’s been accused of taking at least one of the other victims to that same hotel in Miami’s Little Havana neighborhood.
“He then carries her over his shoulder and into one of the motel rooms,” detectives wrote in the warrant. “The victim appeared to be unconscious, incoherent and did not have the ability to walk on her own accord as her legs appeared to hang and were dragging on the pavement prior to being carried by (Maurad-Avecillas).”
Police said surveillance footage also showed him paying the motel clerk with the woman’s credit card and using her Virginia driver’s license.
Detectives interviewed the woman on Feb. 29, the warrant states.
She told detectives that she was out with friends at a nightclub and “her last recollection was using the restroom at the nightclub and then waking up at 77 Motel” at around 9:30 a.m. and said she had not ordered an Uber that night.
The warrant states that she had bruising on her thighs and her phone and Apple Watch were missing; police said she then noticed $200 and $65 charges on her account that she didn’t make.
After Maurad-Avecillas’ arrest in February, Local 10 News reached out to Uber, with a spokesperson saying in a statement:
“There are no words to describe this sickening behavior. We removed the driver’s access as soon as this was reported to us and are supporting law enforcement with their investigation.”
He’s now facing additional charges of kidnapping, fraudulent use of an ID card and fraudulent use of a credit card on top of a host of charges related to the previous cases, including multiple counts of kidnapping, credit card fraud and a sexual battery charge.
Maurad-Avecillas, an Ecuadorian national, remained held without bond in the Metro West Detention Center as of Tuesday.