Lyft driver allegedly drugged, raped teenager in Johnson County who called for a ride

A 44-year-old man accused of raping a teenager in Johnson County allegedly gave her a drink that caused her to feel groggy before driving her to a residential garage in Olathe and assaulting her, according to court documents.

Prosecutors in November filed charges of rape, aggravated criminal sodomy and aggravated sexual battery against the Lyft driver, Gregory James Young, of Kansas City, Kansas. He has been held in the county jail since his arrest.

A criminal complaint filed in the case alleges Young raped the teenager as she was overcome by force or fear, or incapable of providing consent because of the effects of alcohol, narcotics or other substances.

The girl is a juvenile under 17 years old.

Johnson County District Court Judge Thomas Sutherland ordered last week that a redacted version of an affidavit prepared by Olathe police in support of criminal charges be publicly released. The Star obtained a copy of the affidavit through a records request made to the court on Wednesday afternoon.

According to the affidavit, police first made contact with the teenage girl and her mother, whose names are withheld in court documents, at Children’s Mercy Hospital on Oct. 29 to investigate a reported rape.

Witnesses told police the girl and a friend had called for a Lyft the previous night to take them from a house party in Grandview to the Whataburger fast food restaurant in Independence.

During the car ride, the affidavit says, Young allegedly made “several inappropriate comments” of a sexual nature. The girls were offered a free ride back to the house where they had been picked up while Young waited for them to order, the affidavit says.

At one point, the alleged rape victim was offered a soda by Young. She reported that she and her friend drank it, ultimately causing her friend to “black out.”

She said she was driven to several locations around Kansas City before Young took her to Olathe. She said she was taken into a garage set up with mattresses and a TV.

Inside the garage, she said Young began to sexually assault and overpower her.

Olathe police were provided location-tracking information from the girl’s mother. Officers visited a residence where she had been stationary for more than two hours, the affidavit says.

A resident of the home told police Young had been hired to perform maintenance there. A roommate said Young had access to the garage, where he was known to take breaks between his Lyft rides and on occasions “bring females to this house to have sex with them in the garage.”

Police were also told Young was seen “in the garage with a female earlier that morning,” the affidavit says.

Olathe police reached Young by phone as the house was processed for evidence, the affidavit says. During the phone call, Young allegedly described picking up the girls, taking them to Whataburger and “hanging out” afterward.

Asked by police about any sexual contact with the girls, the affidavit says Young was “evasive” and later described a situation of the girls making sexual advances toward him.

He allegedly agreed to meet police the following day for a formal interview but did not show up.

A rape kit was done at Children’s Mercy and processed by the Johnson County Crime Lab. In mid-November, roughly two weeks after police opened the investigation, results from the lab showed DNA recovered from one sample had matched to Young, whose genetic profile was already in a national criminal investigation database.

Young was pulled over Nov. 18 by Prairie Village police while he was driving a female passenger, the affidavit says. He was detained for questioning by Olathe police and to collect a court-ordered DNA sample.

Police also took his car and cellphone. While serving a search warrant on the car, police reported finding a white bottle containing an over-the-counter medicine known to cause drowsiness.

Young is being represented by a Johnson County public defender. An attorney assigned to his case declined to comment.

In response to a request from The Star, a Lyft spokesperson said Young was permanently banned from driving for the company. The company is also helping law enforcement with the criminal investigation, the spokesperson said.

“Safety is fundamental to Lyft,” the company spokesperson said in a statement. “The behavior described is reprehensible and has no place in the Lyft community or anywhere in society.”

Further questions by The Star regarding Young’s employment history and hiring were not addressed in the company’s statement.

A preliminary hearing in Young’s case is scheduled for May 3. Young is held in the Johnson County jail on a $100,000 bond.