North Carolina jury orders Uber to pay in assault case

A federal jury in North Carolina ordered Uber to pay $5,000 after a woman said a driver booked through the app sexually assaulted her, handing the company a modest verdict with potentially outsized consequences for thousands of pending claims.

The plaintiff said the encounter happened after she was dropped off in Raleigh in March 2019, just before 2 a.m. She alleged the driver grabbed her inner thigh and made a sexual remark, prompting her to flee the vehicle. The trial began April 14 and ended with the Raleigh jury’s verdict on April 20.

Uber fought the case by arguing that it is a software company, not a common carrier like a taxi service, and therefore does not owe the same duty under North Carolina law. The company also tried to undercut the claim by pointing to the woman’s prior mental-health and substance-abuse history. After the verdict, an Uber spokesperson said the award was only a tiny fraction of the damages sought and “should further bring these cases back to reality,” while signaling plans to appeal.

The North Carolina case is part of MDL No. 3084, In re: Uber Technologies, Inc., Passenger Sexual Assault Litigation, a federal multidistrict proceeding overseen by U.S. District Judge Charles R. Breyer in the Northern District of California. More than 3,300 similar claims have been consolidated there, making each bellwether trial a high-stakes test of how jurors may react to allegations of passenger abuse and how much exposure Uber may face if the litigation heads toward settlement.

The verdict also follows an earlier federal jury loss for the company in Phoenix, where on February 5 a panel awarded $8.5 million to a woman who said an Uber driver raped her when she was 19. That Arizona decision was the first federal verdict to find Uber liable in a passenger sexual assault case, and the North Carolina award adds another data point for both sides as they assess the value of the broader docket.

Uber’s own safety reports underscore why the litigation has become so significant. Its 2017-2018 U.S. safety report said it received 235 rape reports in 2018 and 229 in 2017, along with 1,560 groping reports in 2018 and 1,440 in 2017. A later 2019-2020 report said the company received 3,824 reports of sexual assault and misconduct over those two years. Even a $5,000 verdict can matter in that context, because every jury decision helps shape the risk calculation for a case inventory that still stretches into the thousands.