Summary
- Brazilian-Australian Lorena, from Brisbane, went to Bali to attend a wedding.
- After attending a party a few days before the wedding, she ordered a motorcycle taxi using the Grab app.
- The taxi driver has been identified as WD and is in police custody.
Trigger alert: this interview contains graphic details about sexual violence.
“Reviewing everything that happened, I realised that there were clues things weren't right,” Lorena recalls as she narrates the "harrowing experience" she had in the tourist paradise of Bali.
These 'clues' could have indicated that she was in danger.
Lorena, a graduate in Maritime Sciences from Griffith University in Brisbane, now wants to warn other women travelling overseas.
Women travelling abroad in groups or alone should be alert to everything... even constantly checking the Google Maps app often displayed by app drivers on the car or motorcycle.Lorena
Modus operandi
On the night of 6 August, Lorena called for a motorcycle taxi from the Grab app.
The journey from the outskirts of Uluwatu, where Lorena was, to Bingin usually takes 15 minutes. But that night, it took over an hour.
Bali is one of the most popular destinations for Australians on vacation. Source: Pixabay
But Lorena was surprised when her taxi driver did things differently.
“He put his phone away. I thought he knew the way, that's why he wasn't using the app,” she recalls.
Much later, she would see on the Grab app that the driver had cancelled the trip and didn't want Lorena to see where he was taking her.
“He kept his mobile phone in his pocket and talked to me a lot, [he was] very friendly,” she says.
Sometimes I tried to give a shorter answer and he insisted on maintaining the dialogue, asking a lot of questions. I feel like he was doing this to distract me.Lorena
That's when Lorena saw that she was in a remote, forest-like dark place “in the middle of the bush, in the middle of nowhere”.
"As soon as we arrived at an empty area, he took me off the motorcycle and threw me on the ground,” she recalls.
The Java Police stated the driver's modus operandi in a media release the next day.
During the trip, the victim was continuously chatted by the perpetrator, to a point where the victim did not pay attention to Google Maps during the trip.Commissioner Jansen Avitus Panjaitan, Bali Police
Fight and escape attempt
“He started uttering obscene words and would lift my skirt,” Lorena says, adding this was one of the most difficult moments for her to remember.
The taxi driver continued, and Lorena says, she struggled.
As her ordeal progressed, Lorena tried some self-defence techniques.
“I tried to pierce his eyes. I had a water bottle in my hand made of thick glass, and I tried to hit him with it. He snatched it out of my hand and threw it away. I ran away," she tells SBS Portuguese.
Lorena managed to escape, even in the dark without knowing where to go.
I was screaming, shouting. No one could hear me, I was in a place far away from everything. And then I started running.Lorena
This happened a few times, with the driver following her and being able to catch up with her after she ran 10 to 50 metres.
“That’s when he came up and put something around my neck, blocked my nose and I couldn’t breathe anymore.
“Then I could see that I may die,” she recalls,
She adds that the more she resisted, the more aggressive he became and that put her life at risk.
I said ‘I can’t breathe’. He then forced me to have sex with him. He said he wasn’t going to kill me, he was going to do that and set me free.Lorena
Lorena remembers that she decided to talk calmly with him to save her life, and that’s what, in her view, saved her.
The arrest
The taxi driver then took Lorena back, leaving her 100 metres from the hostel where she was staying.
Upon arrival, Lorena immediately started tracking her assailant.
She was able to print the app’s screenshot that she took at the time of the attack with the driver’s details on it, which resulted in his immediate identification as 'WD'.
She then contacted Grab (one of the first things any victim must do), followed by Java Police and then went to a hospital, where the DNA samples were collected.
Lorena went to the Brazilian embassy last of all.
In a media release, a Bali police spokesperson, Commissioner Jansen Avitus Panjaitan detailed the arrest of the driver, citing that the police initially tracked WD’s residence in Kerobokan, but he had already left the scene.
Bali Police spokesperson Commissioner Jansen Avitus Panjaitan confirmed the identity of WD, who is now in police custody. Credit: Jakarta Post
“He wanted to go to his uncle’s house in Pasuruan,” Mr Panjaitan confirmed in the media release.
The alleged rape took place in the early hours of 7 August, in a vacant lot on Nyang-Nyang Beach in Jimbaran, South Kuta.
Throughout the trip, he supposedly kept talking to Lorena to distract her from paying attention on the road.Denpasar police chief Bambang Yugo Pamungkas
Bali police worked together with East Java Police to locate WD and he was arrested on 8 August at around 9.30pm.
Lorena today
Just over two weeks after the incident, Lorena continued to stay in Bali where she had to revisit the scene of the attack with the police.
Lorena says that she had to retell her story several times, indicating how she revisited her pain.
But her efforts bore desired results.
There they found my glass bottle and proved it had his DNA.Lorena
Lorena spent hours on end at police stations, supported by two interpreters.
She was thoroughly interrogated by police officers, doctors and other Balinese authorities.
She is now consulting a psychologist and in an extraordinary way, described the attack on her Instagram account and how she is recovering.
Lorena is surprised that she had to calm down some of her friends who felt guilty [for letting her go home by herself in the middle of the night] and who were in shock when they heard what happened.
I had to console them.Lorena
Lorena is now seeking compensation for all costs incurred and feels like she's on a mission to alert other women.
Asked what motivated the 26-year-old to come out and seek justice on the idyllic island of Bali, Lorena says she wants to "bring this guy to justice, to jail".
This will free other women from going through what I've been through.Lorena
"Maybe the taxi company will create a stronger security programme. Maybe the police will improve their interrogation procedures with women who are victims of violence," she says in reply.
While waiting for her return to Australia, Lorena received what she called "fantastic news".
Her application for permanent residence in Australia was approved a week ago and she now has plans to take a long overdue trip to Western Australia.
"I am very grateful to my angels for my life and thank you there for sharing my story," Lorena says.
If you or someone you know is impacted by sexual assault, call 1800RESPECT on 1800 737 732 or visit The Men’s Referral Service provides advice for men on domestic violence and can be contacted on 1300 766 491. In an emergency, call 000. For state-and-territory services, visit
To listen to this interview in Portuguese, click on 'play' above, or search for the SBS Portuguese profile on your favourite podcast aggregator.
