Kais Dahdal: Mother furious and ‘destroyed inside’ after fake Uber driver ruling

A mother who was one of two women sexually touched by a fake Uber driver in the Illawarra last year has been left devastated after the former surgeon was sentenced.

A mother of two has been left devastated after the man who sexually touched her while purporting to be an Uber driver escaped time behind bars.

Kais Dahdal, 35, was sentenced to a seven-month intensive corrections order and fined $350 in Wollongong Local Court on Tuesday for two counts of sexually touching another person without consent and one count of driving without ever holding a licence.

Outside court Ashleigh Rauicava, one of Dahdal’s two victims, described the sentence as “absolute bulls***” with the ruling leaving the Balgownie woman questioning the state’s justice system.

“It’s just absolute bulls*** that he gets to live his life like he’s done nothing wrong,” Ms Rauicava said.

“He gets counselling while the rest of us go through therapy for what he’s done. It’s been nearly a year and I’m still absolutely destroyed inside – it’s not right.

“Our justice system sees it fit that he gets seven months getting rehabilitation, no jail, no nothing – that’s it.”

Dahdal was a surgeon in his native Syria and the magistrate acknowledged he has “probably lost the opportunity” for a career in his desired field.

Ms Rauicava, who has never received an apology, suggested outside court that should be a given.

Ashleigh Rauicava (right) with supporter Nicole Binner outside Wollongong Courthouse on Tuesday. Picture: Dylan Arvela

“I don’t think he should be trusted in medicine,” she said.

“He wrote a letter to the court saying he feels bad – that’s it.”

Ms Rauicava, who was supported in court by her friend Nicole Binner, told a hearing last week that she now struggles trusting men and she told media outside court on Monday that she’s found it difficult using the ridesharing service.

“[I’ve got in an Uber] with friends only just recently, but even my friend the other night realised I was absolutely shaking,” Ms Rauicava said.

“It’s not Uber’s fault, there are a lot of lovely people out there who take good care of people, but he wasn’t an Uber, he was a man pretending to be. What he did was predatory, he lured us into the vehicle.”

The court heard Dahdal’s appalling crimes occurred on the night of Saturday, October 23, 2021, when he was driving his wife’s silver sedan around the Wollongong CBD scouting potential victims.

Both victims had been at the Illawarra Hotel with Dahdal “luring” the first in at around 1.40am and the second, Ms Rauicava, about an hour later.

The first victim‘s app wasn’t working properly when Dahdal pulled up beside her and her friend and after the friend was dropped off, he said “We are just going for a drive” before lighting a cigarette and taking a puff..

Dahdal then grabbed the woman’s thigh and kissed her on the lips – she pulled away before he urged “Want to have some fun?”.

The terrified victim asked “What do you mean fun” with Dahdal replying ”Want to f***?” the court heard.

“No, no... I really need to get home, my boyfriend is waiting for me,” she pleaded.

Kais Dahdal scurrying away from Wollongong Courthouse on Tuesday. Picture: Dylan Arvela

The victim managed to flee the car after chucking $40 at Dahdal and a short time later she messaged a group chat with her friends “The ‘Uber’ that me and my friend got was f*****”.

Ms Rauicava had been waiting outside the popular Wollongong establishment after a friend had ordered her an Uber, and not knowing what car they were driving, she trusted Dahdal when he pulled up alongside her.

Dahdal asked her to sit in the front to offer directions because “the Uber app wasn‘t working”.

Dahdal said “How are you going to pay me?” while reminding Ms Rauicava of his lie that the Uber app wasn‘t working.

The victim offered $25 cash, but Dahdal said she “owed more” before rubbing her leg ”You could pay me in other ways... you can pay me in sex”.

The court heard Ms Rauicava told him to pull over before bolting from the vehicle and calling her mother in hysterics while recounting the horrific experience.

Two days later, police sighted the unlicensed Dahdal driving the vehicle at an intersection in Wollongong with his wife in the passenger seat.

Officers arrested Dahdal and his wife informed them her husband had told her he had picked up a female and drove her home after being “waved down”, however, she didn’t say her husband had done anything to the female.

Dahdal penned a letter to the court which expressed his “full remorse” for the victims, the court, the police, his faith, his family and his wife - the latter who he said had ”lost the respect and faith” in him.

He described his behaviour as “illegal, deceitful and wrong” and said the thought of anyone doing what he had done to his wife, sister, mother or young daughter ”would break his heart”.

In a stunning revelation, Dahdal, who now has a driver‘s licence, admitted his two victims weren’t the only people he enticed into his car under the facade of being an Uber driver.

“I did not have any planning or pre-meditation about what I did,” he said.

“I picked up a number of different people that night, males and females, and took them home or to another location and was paid.

“I know that I was not an actual Uber driver and that this was deceiving.”

Dahdal has not been charged with anything related to other people he may, or may not have, picked up that night.

Dahdal chronicled his life in the Middle East where he worked for the Syrian Arab Red Crescent and saw the “horror of war” and acknowledged his career as a doctor was almost certainly over, as was his chance of becoming an Australian citizen.

“I will never be able to be a doctor again,” he said.

“That statement brings me great disappointment, worry, shame and distress. I am now working as a courier driver for a logistics company.

“To think that I went from a doctor to having to be a courier kills me inside.”

In court on Tuesday, Magistrate Girotto outlined a report that indicated Dahdal was “consumed with receiving the attention of the opposite sex” and commented that the case has ”received intense media scrutiny”.

Dahdal will be under supervision through the ICO and will be required to continue a treatment plan.

The order will expire in February next year.