Man unknowingly in Uber with suspected Michigan shooter jokes, 'You're not the shooter, are you?'

(Image credit: Kalamazoo County Sheriff's Office via Getty Images)

last updated 22 February 2016

An Indiana man visiting Kalamazoo Saturday night — the night Jason Dalton allegedly fatally shot six people in multiple incidents — thought it would be safer for him, his wife, and his in-laws to grab an Uber instead of walking to their hotel room. The man, who NBC affiliate WOOD-TV 8 identified as Derek, did get home safely — after unknowingly riding with the suspected gunman himself, a confirmed Uber driver.

"My father mentioned from the back seat, you know, the situation with the shooter," Derek said. "I kind of jokingly said to the driver, 'You're not the shooter, are you?' He gave me some sort of a 'no' response... shook his head... I said, 'Are you sure?' And he said, 'No, I'm not, I'm just tired.' And we proceeded to have a pretty normal conversation after that."

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Julie Kliegman is a freelance writer based in New York. Her work has appeared in BuzzFeed, Vox, Mental Floss, Paste, the Tampa Bay Times and PolitiFact. Her cats can do somersaults.

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