NEW YORK— A Florida man was charged with killing and dismembering an Uber Eats delivery driver who brought food to his home. A woman was kidnapped and sexually assaulted while making a DoorDash delivery to a hotel.
“It got me scared,” said Kinanda, an immigrant from Kenya who also drives for Uber and Lyft to supplement her income as an elder caregiver. “At the end of the day, being Black is really hard. People see us and think we are doing something wrong.” In a report released Monday, Gig Workers Rising said its own research found that 80 app-based workers have been victims of homicides while on job between 2017 and 2022. The majority were ride-hailing drivers, but at least 20 delivery workers were also killed, according to the report, which relied on press accounts, court records and police reports.
“We have to look out for ourselves because the companies don’t do it,” said Moreno, who worked for Grubhub and Postmates, which was bought out by Uber Eats in 2020, as well as Lyft and Uber. “We have heard loud and clear from drivers that they want more information about who they are picking up,” Uber said in a statement.