Rape Victim Says Attacker Posed As Taxi Driver


A Central Islip man, Adil Raja, was arrested Saturday morning on charges of first-degree rape of a 22-year-old woman.

The woman told police that around 4 a.m. Saturday morning, she was walking on Bay Avenue and Main Street in East Patchogue, New York, when Adil Raja approached her in a car that she assumed to be a cab. Raja, under the pretense of being a cab driver, offered the woman a ride, to which the woman agreed. The woman proceeded to tell the man to drive her near a store in Patchogue. Instead, the man took her to a different location, presented a gun, then raped her in the back seat of the car.

After the rape, the woman got out of the car and Adil Raja drove away. The woman called 911 and gave a description of the car, thereafter it was just minutes before authorities found the car, with Raja in it, on Sunrise Highway service road. Police have said that the car looked nothing like a cab.

Detective Sergeant Kevin Byrne of Suffolk County Police told ABC7:

“It’s a disturbing incident. We think that it is an isolated incident at this time, but we are asking the public if anyone else was a victim of a similar incident to give us a call.”

Prosecutors of the case are saying that biological evidence was recovered from the incident and is a direct match to Raja. A black BB gun was also recovered from Raja, according to prosecutors.

According to his defense attorney, Robert Flink, Raja contends innocence and intends to:

“vigorously [fight] the allegations made by the complaining witness.”

Raja’s bail is set at $750,000 and he has pleaded not guilty.

Featured image by ABC7 via screen capture

Elijah Martinez is a MasterChef and Law and Order:SVU aficionado. Elijah is a full-time student and a polyglot, speaking and writing English, Spanish, and Latin. French and Korean are of interest, the former is a current study, while the latter is a deferred study.