Transcript for 8 hours of terror kick off with wild Uber ride in Kalamazoo: Part 1
with an app. It’s easy. It’s convenient. But the truth is, when that car shows up, you really don’t know who’s in the driver’s seat. Uber driver underrrest. A driver accused of raping his passenger. We’re stepping into a vehicle of a total stranger, who could harm you, who could wreck the car. And so there’s an inherent vulnerability to these ridesharing programs. 911? No one needs to be riding with this crazy man, and he doesn’t need to be on the road. When an Uber passenger places a request, it gets routed to a nearby driver. And as soon as they accept it, they go drive to the passenger. And that passenger will actually see the picture of the driver. And they can follow along on their route as they drive to pick them up. Reporter: It’s 4:21 in the afternoon. And Uber driver Jason Dalton is picking up his first ride of the day. Matt Mellon. Uber had just come to the Kalamazoo area, and he decided that was a way to make some extra money. To raise money for a vacation. He was new to Uber, was just learning how to figure out the app, they had good reviews of his rides. Reporter: This one ride would unleash eight hours of terror in Kalamazoo. And we’ve been covering this story for years now, from the very beginning. Matt Mellen was going to pick up his car after leaving it the night before at a friend’s house. So he picked me up here. Reporter: Do you notice the names of the Uber drivers, when you get in there? I mean, sure. I always look at their photo. Reporter: Right. Do I pay much attention to that? Not really. Matt was one of the first of many people whose life would be affected by Jason Dalton that day. He did have a dog in his back seat. So, I sat in the front seat because the dog was in the back seat. Jason took his dog for a walk before he started driving riders in the Uber. Reporter: So, you hopped in and you started off on the route. At this point, everything was fairly Normal. He did receive a telephone call, and he took it over the bluetooth speaker. It was one of his children. Reporter: How long did that phone call last? It was rather brief. I would say, maybe, two, three minutes. His son calling wanting to know if he wanted dinner. It was dinnertime. He hung up the phone, and things changed. Then, out of nowhere, it was like he was dealing with a completely different person. That’s when he slammed the gas pedal. And then, boom, we were off. Reporter: How fast do you think he was going down these streets? It was pedal to the metal, probably 75, 80 miles an hour down this road. I was bracing for impact, basically. Jason is running stop signs. He’s speeding through traffic. Matt is in the front seat thinking he might die or that their car is going to get “t”-boned. He wants out of that car. He was worried that he wasn’t going to make it home, he wasn’t going to see his family or friends again. He was terrified. I was pleading for him to stop at this point ’cause it was like, “You just hit that car.” And he’s like, “I didn’t hit any car.” Reporter: Is his tone Normal? Is he sort of conversational? Yeah, yeah. He was rather calm. And he’s like, “What’s wrong with the way I’m driving?” Reporter: As he’s going 75 miles an hour down these residential streets? Yeah, swerving in and out of traffic. We were going so fast, blew right through this. At one point, I even thought about hitting him. I was like, “Oh, there’s my friend’s street.” Reporter: You were just trying to get him to stop. Yes. There’s my friend’s house. Finally, he slammed on his brakes. I heard this loud screeching noise. And our neighborhood is normally very quiet and very subdued. There’ally any traffic. So I ran out into the front yard. The silver Chevy equinox came screeching to a halt, and a door flew open, and, like, this guy does a tumble roll out of the car. And I couldn’t tell if he had been pushed, shoved, or he actually jumped out of the car. I see this driver. Dark, heavy rimmed glasses, crazy gray hair. He looked very agitated. Reporter: Did he immediately take off again? Yeah, yeah. He burned his tires out. I was like, “Call 911. Call 911.” At that point, I was also dialing 911. 911. I was just in the car with my Uber driver. He was weaving in and out of la he sideswiped a car. What kind of car was it? It was Chevy. Did you want to talk to officer? I just want them to be on the lookout. Hank you. Which unfortunately, they did not see that vehicle, he did not wish to be contacted.there’s no complainant, there’s not much they can do. When I got home, I contacted Uber, via e-mail. Reporter: Back in 2016, there was no way to immediately call a human at Uber in case of an emergency. Who exactly is this Uber driver, Jason Dalton? What do we know about him? To me, the most remarkable thing about him was how unremarkable he was going into February 20th. Jason, by all accounts, was an unremarkable character. He had a nine to five job, with a family. Reporter: A father that posted pictures on Facebook, you see him with his wife and kids on the couch. They had married for over 20 years. Reporter: On a boat, playing with his kids. Just seemed like anormal, nice guy. Jason grew up in Indiana. He moved to Kalamazoo during high school. I was the best man in his wedding. He could make conversation with just about anyone. He was not afraid to speak his mind, but definitely not out to cause trouble. He liked to work oncars, figure out how cars worked. But he also liked guns. There was something that occurred, a break-in, someone stole some of his tools. That bothered him, I believe that’s what caused him to start collecting guns. Nothing that would cause you to go, oh, my gosh. He had 15 guns at the house. The guns were all legally owned. Any of the guns he was in possession of. I think you’ll find in this community and many others, I don’t think his ownership and the number of guns was anything unusual, frankly. Reporter: Before Jason Dalton took this incredibly ride, the day had been completely ordinary, at least for him. He met a friend, and they visited a couple of local gun stores. Which was typical for them. When Jason Dalton goes to the gun shop, he buys both a holster and a jacket. Jason was friendly with him, smiled, laughed, gave him a little hug as they walked to the cash register. He said, have a nice day, and he said, I’m going out to enjoy the weather, and that was it. After Matt was able to escape from the wild ride with Jason Dalton, Jason Dalton then went home. He ended up going home to his house, and retrieving his weapons. At that point, we know he had a Glock 19 9 millimeter. Jason puts on a bulletproof veand goes out to pick up passengers. But this time, he’s packing heat, he’s off to the fateful route where he will in with so many unsuspecting people. We often say, things can change in a second. And in this case, it changed like that. Please hurry up, shots have been fired. That’s when the horror
This transcript has been automatically generated and may not be 100% accurate.
