Woman raises thousands for Uber driver who helped her after her belongings were stolen at Coachella
An Uber driver’s decision to help a woman who had everything stolen from her, including her phone during Weekend 2 of the Coachella Music Festival, has grabbed the world’s attention.
Their story has gone viral on social media with more than 3 million views on TikTok and nearly half-a-million likes on Twitter.
It all began when Becca Moore said she had her belongings stolen while she was at Coachella. “On the Sunday of Coachella, I realized that I didn’t have my phone, my credit card or my keys,” Moore said.
It’s a moment Moore will never forget- being in a city with no way to ask for help. “The hotel concierge called me an Uber and that Uber was Raul."
Raul Torres told News Channel 3's Samantha Lomibao that he almost didn’t accept the ride, “I wasn’t supposed to go anymore but finally I did it for one more day.”
When Torres found out Moore had her belongings stolen, he chose to stay with her all day. “I was just happy to help her, you know what I mean. It’s just weird but you know I couldn’t leave her back there because she didn’t know nobody there so I had to help her out,” Torres said.
“He wasn’t gonna leave me and he took care of me the entire day without any expectation of anything in return,” Moore added.
After helping Moore file a police report, the two grabbed food and started talking about their personal lives.
That’s when Moore realized Torres needed more help than she needed his. “And he was like, when is your birthday? And I said oh, mine’s June 16th and he said that we the date of when his daughter was diagnosed with cancer 2 years ago.”
Moore found out Torres actually drove down from Fresno, to make some extra money for his daughter’s chemotherapy.
His father was also battling terminal cancer and lost his battle last Friday.
“I was so worried about my phone and he was too for me," Moore said, "And he didn’t mention his daughter and his dad weren’t doing well with medical issues and those are real medical issues that I wouldn’t have known about if I didn’t prompt the questions... so yeah, it’s just insane. You never know what people are going through.”
Moore decided to use her following on social media to bring attention to Torres’s situation, and to help him raise money.
Moore created a GoFundMe to help raise money for his daughter's medical expenses and his father's funeral. “I don’t think strangers are strangers anymore. I think everyone’s going through something that we can relate to on different levels and I just view people as friends that I haven’t met yet."
In just 24 hours, her $1000 goal ended up raising more than $100,000.
Torres said he never expected anything would come out of his instinct to help.
“I was just overwhelmed cuz like there’s not too many people that do help you know. And there’s a lot of people but very few and it’s good to see that. There’s people that help each other you know what I mean. When someone needs help somebody will be there to help you and it’s when you least expect it.”
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