Federal Judge Rejects Uber Bid To Throw Out First Bellwether Trial

A federal judge has denied a last-ditch effort by Uber Technologies, Inc. to throw out the first federal bellwether trial in the sprawling Uber passenger sexual assault multidistrict litigation (MDL), keeping a landmark case on track that could influence thousands of similar lawsuits nationwide, Daily Journal reported.

Judge Charles R. Breyer’s ruling came as Uber sought to set aside the trial over concerns including publicity and potential jury bias, but the court refused to grant Uber’s requests for a mistrial or to delay the proceedings, signaling that the scheduled jury trial will proceed as planned.

The federal MDL, consolidated in the Northern District of California, involves more than 3,000 lawsuits from survivors who allege that Uber failed to protect riders from sexual assault and sexual misconduct during rides arranged through its platform. In addition to federal filings, state court actions are also moving forward, with hundreds of cases still pending in various jurisdictions.

The first federal bellwether case arises from an alleged sexual assault that occurred after a woman requested an Uber ride in the Phoenix metropolitan area. According to court filings and testimony, the plaintiff alleges she was assaulted by her Uber driver after being picked up in Arizona, and that Uber failed to prevent the attack despite years of internal data documenting similar incidents. The case focuses on whether Uber’s safety representations to riders matched what the company knew internally about sexual assault risks, particularly for women traveling alone at night. While the survivor has been identified by name in some news coverage, it is the policy of SurvivorsRights.com to keep survivors’ identities out of the spotlight and center reporting on systemic accountability rather than individual exposure.

Although the assault at issue occurred in Arizona and the trial is being held in the Phoenix area, the broader Uber passenger sexual assault litigation is centralized in the Northern District of California as a federal multidistrict litigation. The MDL was assigned there because Uber is headquartered in San Francisco, and many of the core legal questions involve corporate policies, internal safety data, and decision making that originated at the company’s California headquarters. For bellwether purposes, however, individual cases are often tried in the jurisdictions where the alleged assaults occurred, allowing juries to evaluate claims under the factual circumstances most relevant to each survivor. This structure lets one federal court oversee coordinated pretrial proceedings while still testing real world cases before local juries, a process expected to shape negotiations and trial strategy across thousands of pending Uber sexual assault claims nationwide.

Survivor attorneys and public reporting have underscored the staggering scale of reported sexual misconduct on Uber’s platform. Previously sealed court records revealed through media investigations indicate that Uber received more than 400,000 reports of sexual assault or sexual misconduct between 2017 and 2022 — an average of roughly one such report every eight minutes — far more than the company publicly disclosed in its official safety reports. Those disclosures have intensified criticism that Uber understated the scope of risk faced by riders and resisted implementing stronger safety measures, such as enhanced driver vetting or in-vehicle monitoring.

Another significant issue addressed by the court involves the judge’s decision to allow evidence and argument tied to what has become known as the “one assault every 8 minutes” framing of Uber’s internal data. Plaintiffs have pointed to aggregated reporting derived from Uber’s own safety data to illustrate the frequency of reported sexual assault and sexual misconduct on the platform over several years, arguing it helps jurors understand scale and foreseeability rather than focusing on isolated incidents. Uber sought to exclude that characterization, contending it was inflammatory and misleading, but the judge ruled that the jury could hear evidence placing reported assaults in a broader statistical context, so long as it was grounded in admissible data. The ruling allows plaintiffs to argue that Uber was aware of the volume and regularity of reported sexual assault incidents across its platform, reinforcing claims that the risk to riders was not rare or unforeseeable but a persistent issue known at the corporate level.

Uber has published periodic safety reports detailing serious incident statistics and asserting that serious sexual assault rates declined by approximately 44% from 2017 to 2022, and that the vast majority of trips occur without incident. But plaintiffs argue that the company’s internal data and external reporting paint a more troubling picture of risk and underreporting, and that more than 500 additional cases have continued to join the MDL in recent months.

The federal bellwether trial, the first of what may be many, will test core disputes about Uber’s safety practices, internal priorities, and the adequacy of its background checks and preventative measures. How jurors respond to both sides’ evidence and narratives could influence settlement talks and future trial strategy across the MDL and state court dockets.

As the litigation unfolds, additional bellwether trials are already scheduled in both federal and state courts, each offering a further glimpse into how juries evaluate allegations that a global rideshare platform failed to protect those who trusted it for their safety.