The D.C. Council passed a bill Tuesday that stiffens the penalties for assaulting a Metro transit operator by 50 percent after the crimes spiked last year.
There were 84 assaults against Metrobus drivers last year, with more than 50 of them in the District of Columbia.
“The assaults range from being spit on, to hit with sticks, bricks, poles, open hands, guns and knives, to fondling and attempting to undress an operator,” Milo Victoria, Metro’s bus operations chief, said recently. “Oftentimes customers are angry about something and they take it out on the driver.”
Under the new law, such attacks against transit operators would carry a 50 percent higher fine or 50 percent longer maximum jail sentence than assaults against regular citizens.
For example, the maximum jail time for someone who commits assault with a dangerous weapon is currently 10 years in the District, but would be 15 years if that assault were committed against a Metrobus driver.
Officials hope the move will deter such assaults.
“This will protect not only the bus operators, but also the riding public, because when that happens to a bus operator, the public is in danger also,” said Jacki Jeter, president of Amalgamated Transit Union Local 689, the union that represents many Metro workers.
The union and Metro officials had been lobbying for the legislation in the District and Maryland since last year.
Similar legislation failed in the Maryland General Assembly this session.
“This is a win, and we’ll take this one and we’ll try again in Maryland another day,” Jeter said.
Metro has installed protective plastic shields between bus operators and passengers on six buses in a pilot program designed to test their effectiveness in preventing assaults.
