A Montgomery County Uber driver has been held over for court on all charges related to the alleged rape of a Villanova University student on campus in September.
Mirvan Dinler, 26, of the 200 block of Washington Court in Trappe, is charged with rape by forcible compulsion, rape of an unconscious person, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse by forcible compulsion, sexual assault, reckless endangerment, indecent assault without consent, indecent assault of an unconscious person and aggravated indecent assault without consent.
Assistant District Attorney Danielle Gallaher withdrew one count of IDSI of a person substantially impaired and added the aggravated indecent assault charge ahead of the preliminary hearing before Magisterial District Judge Sloan Walker.
Walker heard from the alleged victim, 21, who said she had planned to go out to celebrate a friend’s birthday on Sept. 13.
The alleged victim told Gallaher she had not eaten that day and drank approximately three glasses of wine and two shots of moonshine beginning around 7 or 7:30 p.m. She then accompanied three friends in an Uber to a club in Northeast Philadelphia.
The alleged victim said she is not used to drinking and began to feel nauseous. Upon arriving at the club, the woman said she decided to head home instead of forcing her friends to babysit her all night. She called an Uber to come get her and her friends stayed with her on the sidewalk until she was picked up.
An affidavit of probable cause for Dinler’s arrest written by Delaware County Detective James Simpkins and Radnor Detective Jonathan Jagodinski stated a receipt showed the ride request was placed at 10:14 p.m. on Sept. 13 and that she was picked up by “Mirvan” at approximately 10:19 p.m. on the 900 block of North Watts Street.
The receipt indicates the ride ended at 11:08 p.m. at Villanova University, but the alleged victim said she had no memory of it.
“I don’t remember the drive at all,” she told Gallaher. “…I woke up in my dorm room. I didn’t really know where I was. I recognized that I was in my dorm room after a few moments because I have this specific light that I use and that was on in my dorm room, and I realized there was this random man who I had never seen on top of me. He was inside of me. All of my clothes were off and he was having vaginal sex with me.”
The alleged victim said she had no idea how the man had gotten into her room. She said she did not cry out or try to resist, figuring it was safer to let him finish in the hopes that it did not turn violent.
She said at one point he forced her to perform oral sex on him by holding her head. The woman said she could barely move because she was still highly intoxicated and was only vaguely aware of what was happening.
“I honestly disassociated from most of the event because I was really scared,” she said.
At one point, the man left but returned later, pounding on her door. She told defense attorney Shaka Mzee Johnson that he was demanding money for her having thrown up in his car.
The alleged victim said she unlocked her phone and passed it through a cracked door so he could make a Venmo payment to himself because he was not going to leave until he had that.
But the alleged victim said she did not recall stopping on the ride to Villanova or requesting a Venmo payment from Dinler.
She also did not recall getting to her room on the fourth floor of Hovnanian Hall, but must have used her identification to swipe into the outside door and her single dorm room.
Detectives reviewed campus security footage that showed the woman being escorted toward Hovnanian Hall by a man about 11:09 and 11:10 p.m., according to the affidavit. The alleged victim’s access card was used at 11:10 p.m. to enter the hall, and then two minutes later used to access her room.
The alleged victim said she remembered asking a resident adviser who was in the hall with Dinler after his return to make him go away. She estimated from a pause in texts that he had been in her room for about a half-hour.
She has no roommates and said she did not figure out that her alleged assailant was her Uber driver until the next day. She identified Dinler in court as the man who was on top of her when she came to.
Investigators had spoken to the RA and another witness who both identified Dinler as being in the hall that night, according to the affidavit.
Radnor Township police were also able to capture a Toyota Prius with a license plate matching that on record for Dimler traveling east on Lansdale Avenue toward the campus at 11:03 p.m. Sept. 13, and heading west on Lancaster, away from the campus, at 12:30 a.m. on Sept. 14, according to the affidavit.
Johnson reserved argument and Judge Walker held Dinler on all charges. He has a formal arraignment date of Jan. 2 at the Delaware County Courthouse in Media.
Dinler remains free on $25,000 bail.
