By Daniel Wiessner
April 20(Reuters) - A federal jury in North Carolina on Monday said Uber should pay $5,000 to a woman who claimed she was sexually assaulted by a driver she booked through the app, as the company faces thousands of similar claims.
The Raleigh, North Carolina, jury verdict followed a trial that began April 14. It comes after a separate jury in Arizona earlier this year awarded $8.5 million to a woman who claimed an Uber driver had raped her when she was 19.
Although Monday's award
is relatively small, it further establishes that jurors may not hesitate to find Uber liable for assaults by drivers in more of the 3,300 similar cases consolidated in federal court.
Both cases are so-called "bellwethers," or test cases for that litigation, and the verdicts could help determine the value of the remaining lawsuits for any potential settlement or resolution of the cases en masse.
The plaintiff, who is not identified in court filings, claims that upon arriving at her destination in Raleigh just before 2 a.m. in March 2019, her Uber driver grabbed her inner thigh and asked if he could “keep it with him," prompting her to flee from the vehicle.
Uber, which has faced numerous safety controversies, argued during the trial that it is a software company and not a "common carrier" such as a taxi service that has a legal duty to protect passengers under North Carolina law. Even if the plaintiff proved otherwise, Uber argued, the company is not liable for the actions of an independent contractor.
The company also argued that the plaintiff could not show any harm resulting from the incident, saying her medical history showed longstanding mental health and substance abuse issues prior to 2019.
An Uber spokesperson said the jury's award represents a tiny fraction of the damages sought by the plaintiff and "should further bring these cases back to reality."
"That said, we believe the jury was once again incorrectly instructed on the question of liability and have strong grounds for appeal on that important point," the spokesperson said in a statement.
Lawyers for the plaintiff said the verdict was a clear signal that Uber cannot escape responsibility for its drivers' conduct, and called it shameful that the company had made an issue of the plaintiff's personal history.
Uber is also facing more than 500 additional cases making similar claims in California state court. The company in September won the only trial to take place thus far in those cases when a jury found that it had failed to put measures in place to protect the plaintiff's safety, but that its negligence was not a substantial factor in causing her harm.
(Reporting by Daniel Wiessner in Albany, New York, Editing by Alexia Garamfalvi and Aurora Ellis)
