An Indian taxi driver in New Zealand will face trial for allegedly indecently assaulting a radio host in Auckland.
28-year-old Baljeet Singh is accused of groping radio host Jay Jay Harvey and following her into her house last year.
Mr Singh appeared in the Auckland District Court on Tuesday and maintained his not guilty plea, thereported. He has elected a trial by jury over the charges.
The taxi driver was arrested and charged with one count of indecent assault after Ms Harvey reported the October 1, 2017 incident to the police after sharing her experience on social media.
According to Ms Harvey, the assault occurred after she took a taxi to return to her apartment from a bar.
Jay Jay Harvey Source: Facebook
“The driver was very forward with his conversation with me and asked a lot of personal questions which I tried to answer without giving too much away.
"He kept asking me if he could touch my breasts and kept holding my hand which I promptly let go of each time. He was asking if I would be his girlfriend," the radio host wrote on her saying the incident made her uncomfortable and nervous.
"I was laughing to make him assume I thought he was joking but he kept grabbing my hand and asking about my breasts.
"He told me he just wanted to touch them.”
“We pulled up outside my apartment block and he told me he would let me off my $17 fare if I would hook up with him and then he reached over and started fondling my boobs!" she alleges.
She said she pushed away his hand and said no but the driver allegedly followed her across the road to her flat after he eventually accepted the fare.
“[He] got out of the car to follow me across the road to my flat. 'I'm coming in with you,' he said to me. 'No you're not,' I told him back and I walked as quickly as I could."
She said the driver was only a couple of meters behind her when she swiped her access card to get into the building and managed to shut him out by bolting up the stairs.
"I got inside safely and watched out the window as he stood in the middle of the street looking up trying to figure out which flat I was in.
"What a creep. Did he drive taxis for the purpose of preying on drunk girls?" she wrote on Facebook before removing the post.
A trial date has been set for November this year.
Two Indian migrants were jailed for seven years in New Zealand in October last year over the December 2013 rape of a drunk teenager.
A 25-year-old Indian farm worker was jailed in September 2017 for sex offence against a 14-year-old daughter of a colleague in NZ.
