A Denver judge on Friday sentenced a former ride-share driver to 290 years to life after prosecutors said he abducted a dozen women over four years by falsely posing as the driver they requested.
The man, John Pastor-Mendoza, was convicted in late October on 30 charges related to the kidnapping, attempted sexual assault and sexual assault of the women between 2018 and 2022.
Mr. Pastor-Mendoza, 43, who lived in Denver, falsely claimed to be the driver for women who used a ride-sharing app, picking them up outside downtown bars and clubs.
The women he targeted appeared intoxicated and were unaware that, though Mr. Pastor-Mendoza was a driver for Lyft, he was not the correct driver assigned to pick them up, the authorities said.
Lyft said that there were no records of these rides and that Mr. Pastor-Mendoza was likely making the trips off the books, The Washington Post reported. Lyft did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Saturday.
According to John Walsh, the Denver district attorney, Mr. Pastor-Mendoza would either sexually assault the women once they got into his car or take them to another location and assault them there.
“Pastor-Mendoza victimized 12 women in a calculated, cruel and contemptible series of crimes over four years,” Mr. Walsh said in a news release. He called the sentence, by Judge Karen Brody of the Denver District Court, “entirely appropriate.”
“We should all be grateful for the courage of Pastor-Mendoza’s victims, who came forward and testified at trial to ensure that Pastor-Mendoza will no longer have the opportunity to harm our community,” Mr. Walsh added.
Mr. Pastor-Mendoza was convicted of kidnapping the 12 women, sexually assaulting two of them, attempting to sexually assault seven of them and robbery. Mr. Pastor-Mendoza maintained his innocence at the sentencing on Friday, according to a spokeswoman for the district attorney’s office.
When Mr. Pastor-Mendoza was charged in October 2022, the Denver police announced that DNA evidence from at least three of the victims was a match for Mr. Pastor-Mendoza.
Rachel Perry, one of the women assaulted by Mr. Pastor-Mendoza, said that her fight-or-flight response kicked in when she realized he was not driving her to her intended destination in March 2019, according to a November news release.
“We are strong, we fought and we fought hard,” Ms. Perry told reporters alongside seven other victims at the courthouse on Friday, the television station KUSA reported. “I survived a monster. We all did. And today, I feel like we got justice.”
