Uber Escapes Liability for Sexual Assaults by Impostor Drivers

Uber Technologies Inc. lacked any duty to protect rideshare users from criminals posing as its drivers, and thus will avoid liability to three women who allege they were lured by the company’s decals and sexually assaulted, a California appeals court said.

The rape scheme may have been foreseeable to Uber, but the crimes weren’t a “necessary component” of the company’s app or actions, Justice Frances Rothschild said Wednesday for the California Court of Appeal, Second District. The alleged actions of Uber and two related companies didn’t “create the risk that criminals would take advantage of the existence of the ...