Lawyers Liken Alleged Philadelphia Train Attack to Sexual Assault on Incapacitated Person

A man accused of rape on a train outside Philadelphia was ordered to be held for trial by a judge Monday, according to The Associated Press.

Fiston Ngoy, 35, is accused of forcing himself on an unconscious woman on a train and is charged with rape and other crimes. The attack occurred Oct. 13 on a Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA) train, with other passengers reportedly unaware it was happening, although bystanders were initially criticized by police for not intervening and allegedly recording the incident.

The woman, whose name has been withheld, testified Monday that she drank a few beers before getting on the train, the AP reported. Ngoy allegedly kept trying to talk to and force himself on her before she pushed him off. She said she later blacked out.

Police said the surveillance video substantiates the woman's account, and she tried to push him away several times on the 40-minute train ride before losing consciousness. Ngoy allegedly is seen in the video taking off the woman's pants and assaulting her about six minutes before the train stopped at its destination, where he was arrested.

Ngoy's attorney said during the hearing that prosecutors had not provided evidence that Ngoy's claim of the encounter being consensual was not true. Later, a prosecutor compared the attack to something one would see at a college party, where someone is intoxicated and loses consciousness and is then taken advantage of, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer.

One of the estimated 10 passengers in the train car was an off-duty SEPTA employee, who was the one that called police because they thought "something wasn't right." Police entered the car and arrested Ngoy minutes after the employee's call.

For more reporting from The Associated Press, see below.

Ngoy was being held on 10 percent of $180,000 bail and is scheduled to be arraigned in county court in January.

The court appearance came the same day as two Philadelphia City Council committees held a joint hearing on safety concerns aboard SEPTA vehicles.

The hearing was prompted by a series of high-profile altercations including an attempted sexual assault at the 69th Street Terminal later in October and a filmed attack on Asian-American students that led to assault and ethnic intimidation charges against four juveniles.

At the hearing, SEPTA officials said the police department has more than 40 open officer positions, leaving about 213 active officers.

But representatives from the officer's union said many officers call out some days, leaving the department even more short-staffed. Union representatives balked at SEPTA plans to hire contractors and private security officers to work at stations and fill the gap.

"You would be better off taking that money outside and setting it on fire," said Omari Bervine, president of the local Fraternal Order of Transit Police lodge, who urged the transportation authority to invest in the police department.

SEPTA officials also touted programs that pair nursing students, social workers and other service providers with transit workers or transit police to intervene in situations with homeless individuals, people who may need addiction services and people who may need mental health interventions. Officials also said they were looking at a program that would put graduate students who are studying child psychology on trains during school dismissal times.

A handful of council members asked for a larger uniformed police presence, and argued both the private security officers and the intervention workers would not be able to intervene in violent altercations.