Taxicab Driver Explains Accused Duke Player's Alleged Alibi

April 20, 2006 — -- Cab driver Moezeldin Almostafa only had two fares the night of March 13, and both of them could be central to the Duke lacrosse case.

New information he provided ABC news has expanded his role in the rape investigation from the element of an alibi to an eyewitness of what took place outside 610 North Buchanan Blvd.

"It's hard to commit a crime if you don't have the time to do it" may be the argument defense attorneys bring to the table to keep Reade Seligmann, one of the Duke lacrosse players indicted for allegedly raping and kidnapping a 27-year-old woman working as an exotic dancer at an off-campus party, out of prison.

Sources close to the defense say the window of time between the end of the alleged victim's dance and Seligmann's departure on the night of the party is too narrow for him for him to have committed the crime.

A third-party witness who saw Seligmann leave the party is the man who took him away from it: taxi driver Moezeldin Almostafa. In his first interview about the incident, Almostafa described the night in question and the time he spent with the indicted lacrosse player to ABC News Senior Legal Correspondent Chris Cuomo.

Almostafa recalled Seligmann's call requesting a pickup on the corner of Watts and Urban streets.

"I remember that I got a phone call past midnight around 12:14," he told Cuomo and the ABC News Law and Justice Unit. "I got the call. I went to meet him."

Almostafa's Sprint cell phone bill, which was reviewed by ABC News, shows an incoming call from Seligmann's phone number at 12:14 a.m. He said he remembered what the men looked like when he picked them up, describing their attire as T-shirts and shorts and referring to the 6-foot-1-inch, 215 pound Seligmann as "a tall, big guy."

When they got in the car, he said, the men asked him to go to a nearby Wachovia ATM and then to a drive-thru restaurant on Hillsborough Road. After that, he said, they went to the Edens dorm on West Campus, where university records seen by ABC News show Seligmann's swipe card being used to enter the building at 12:46 a.m. Almostafa told Cuomo that he watched them enter the gate.