Widow Blames Cab Company for Killing

HOUSTON (CN) - The widow of a Yellow Cab driver says the company did not warn its drivers that a cabbie had been killed on a late-night dispatch to a west Houston gas station. Two nights later, the company sent her husband to the same gas station, "where he met his death when he picked up the same couple who robbed and killed" the first driver, she says.

Stephanie Nwokenaka sued Yellow Cab Taxis Fiesta Cares in Harris County Court.

She says the cab company "failed to inform other drivers of the incident, the nature of the crime and more importantly the time and location of the incident" after the first cabbie was murdered on Oct. 12, 2010.

She says the company dispatched the late Mohammed Elsayed to a Chevron station, where he was robbed and killed. "Two nights later, on October 14, 2010, before the guilty parties had been apprehended Yellow Cab again received a call from the same Chevron gas station for a pick up. On that night, Yellow Cab dispatched the decedent, Blaise Nwokenaka who was an independent contractor without informing him of the potential dangerous nature of the fare," his widow says.

She says her husband, "not knowing of the events that transpired a few days ago, took the call and drove to Chevron where he met his death when he picked up the same couple who robbed and killed Mohammad Elsayed two nights earlier."

Her husband "was found dead sometime around 5 a.m. the following morning. He had been shot to death in the driver seat and he sustained burn injuries from a partially burned car."

Nwokenaka seeks exemplary damages for negligence and wrongful death, on her own behalf and for their four children.

Houston media have reported that Danielle Hudson and Chaz Blackshear, both 21 at the time of the murders, confessed to the murders.

Hudson said she made the calls to lure the cabbies to the gas station, and Blackshear admitted he killed them, according to ABC News. They are charged with capital murder.

Nwokenaka is represented by Ijeoma Opara.

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