Uber Trial Loss Shows Competing Liability Paths in Assault Suits

Uber Technologies Inc.‘s $8.5 million trial loss in the first federal bellwether trial over the sexual assault of a passenger is an early boost for plaintiffs’ lawyers looking to prove that Uber is legally responsible for the actions of its drivers.

The nine-person Arizona federal jury found last week that Uber is liable for claims from a woman passenger, Jaylynn Dean, who alleged that her Uber driver raped her in 2023. The Uber driver was acting as an apparent agent of the company, the jury found, but they rejected claims that the rideshare company itself acted negligently in its safety standards or designed a defective product.

The verdict follows one from last year out of a California state court trial in San Francisco, where a jury determined Uber was negligent in its safety practices, but didn’t find liability because its actions weren’t a substantial cause of a 2016 sexual assault incident.

Though the two juries came to different conclusions, the verdicts give some credence to both theories of liability plaintiffs’ lawyers have used in these cases: Uber’s own actions or omissions are to blame for sexual assaults by drivers and Uber is a “principle” responsible for the actions of its drivers, who are “agents.”

“What’s happening in both is that juries are finding, under one theory or another, that Uber is generally responsible for the actions of its drivers,” said Adam Zimmerman, a law professor at the University of Southern California who studies mass tort litigation. “But two cases are just not enough.”

The outcome in the case tried in Arizona federal court is the first of over a dozen upcoming federal trials—each with a different set of facts and state laws—that will shape the remaining 3,000 sexual assault cases against Uber around the country.

Judge Charles Breyer, who is overseeing the federal lawsuits in consolidated multidistrict litigation, said the next bellwether trial will take place in North Carolina in April. Breyer sits on the San Francisco-based US District Court for the Northern District of California, where the cases are consolidated under one docket, but he will conduct the trials in the jurisdictions where the lawsuits were filed.

Bellwethers help provide a road map for the parties as they begin to negotiate settlements for the thousands of remaining lawsuits.

Claiming Victory

Although Uber was ultimately found liable by the Arizona jury, the company still hailed the verdict as a partial victory.

The jury rejected Dean’s first two legal theories that sought to pin direct liability on Uber.

Her attorneys argued that Uber acted negligently, pointing to internal documents and company statements suggesting that Uber sought to maximize profits even if it came at the expense of safety for women riders.

The attorneys also argued that Uber designed a defective app because at the time of Dean’s assault it lacked requirements for dash-mounted cameras or a feature allowing women riders to request female drivers.

In a statement following the verdict, Uber said the jury’s decision “affirms that Uber acted responsibly.”

The jury instead found a path to liability under the theory of apparent agency, which says that Uber is legally responsible for the actions of its agents, which in that case was the driver. Uber has long argued that it lacks legal authority for its drivers, who it has sought to classify as contractors instead of employees.

Uber said it would appeal this portion of the verdict, arguing that the jury received bad instructions.

Michael Green, a tort law professor at Washington University School of Law, said that in many jurisdictions, a principle like Uber can’t be held liable for the actions of its agent if the agent does something that isn’t in Uber’s interest. In the California state court case last year, for example, the judge dismissed claims that Uber is independently liable for the actions of its drivers before the case reached trial.

“A lot of people might say that this busts open liability for Uber but I’m not so convinced,” Green said of the Arizona verdict. “In part because of the California verdict and also because juries often come to different conclusions.”

But the law could be changing in favor of plaintiffs. Green said the American Law Institute last year amended its highly cited legal treaties, Restatement of Torts, to include a rule that employers can be liable for employees who commit sexual assaults against third parties.

The Arizona panel awarded Dean $8.5 million to compensate for her past and future mental health harms, but it declined to award any additional damages meant to punish Uber. Dean’s attorneys had originally sought $120 million in punitive damages.

“It could have been much worse for them,” said Christine Dunn, an attorney at Sanford Heisler Sharp McKnight LLP who litigates mass torts and sexual assault cases. “But $8.5 million is not a small number, especially if they end up with similar losses in the other 3,000 cases out there.”