Cab driver charged with molesting girl

By Megan Matteucci

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

A Clayton County cab driver is in jail charged with molesting a 10-year-old girl while driving her to school.

David Alvarado Perez, 43, is charged with child molestation, sexual battery against a child under the age of 16 and enticing a child for indecent purposes, according to Magistrate Court records.

He is being held in the Clayton County jail on a $35,000 bond for the three charges.

Perez, of Forest Park, was in court on Tuesday and applied for a court-appointed attorney, according to court records.

Jail records show Perez was arrested Sept. 16.

Perez was a driver for Express Car Services in Jonesboro for about a year, said Dakiris Gonzalez, who owns the cab company.

“He used to work here, but he’s in jail now,” Gonzalez said Tuesday night. “There’s nothing I can do about it.”

Gonzalez said she didn’t know Perez and another driver had been transporting the little girl to school and the store for about a year.

“The mom called, saying he touched her daughter,” Gonzalez said. “I don’t think he did it because this little girl has been riding by herself for a year.”

The cab company’s policies prohibit transporting minors without a guardian, Gonzalez said.

“I didn’t know they were doing it, but the mom was a regular client,” she said. “She would put the girl in the car and pay the driver to take the girl to school.”

The child’s mother told WSB that the girl jumped out of the moving cab and ran to school, where she told counselors about the inappropriate touching.

Court records show Perez was charged in January with operating a taxi without a permit and failing a taxi inspection.