May 28, 2026
The U.S. Supreme Court’s green light of negligent hiring claims against freight brokers in highway crash cases and an adverse verdict against Uber in the sexual assault multidistrict litigation lead Law360’s Injury Law Roundup.
Here, we put Law360 readers on notice of what’s been trending recently in personal injury and medical malpractice news.
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NC Jury Finds Uber Liable for Driver Battery in Second Bellwether Trial
Uber was hit with its second consecutive loss in a bellwether trial held in North Carolina in multidistrict litigation over driver sex assaults, which experts said was a key outcome because it represented the lower end of the spectrum of assaults on passengers.
A federal jury in Charlotte, North Carolina, found on April 20 that an Uber driver committed battery against a passenger who accused him of grabbing her leg in 2019, and it awarded her $5,000 in damages, capping off a four-day bellwether trial against the ride-hailing giant. Earlier in the case, Uber was deemed a “common carrier” under North Carolina law with a nondelegable duty to safely transport passengers.
The MDL, which encompasses more than 3,100 cases, alleges Uber has known for more than a decade that drivers for its app preyed on and sexually assaulted vulnerable passengers and didn’t implement proper policies.
In the first bellwether trial, an Arizona federal jury in February determined that the driver was acting as the “apparent agent” of Uber, making the ride-hailing company liable for the assault, and awarded $8.5 million in compensatory damages.
One plaintiffs attorney and former prosecutor praised the outcome of the North Carolina trial, telling Law360 that despite the modest damages award, it was a solid victory for the plaintiffs.
“It’s a superb outcome in terms of the finding of liability against Uber,” said Takisha Richardson of Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll PLLC, which is not handling any Uber MDL cases. “The biggest challenge in these cases is whether Uber is liable for the conduct of these drivers.”
The case is important, Richardson said, because it represented the lower end of the spectrum of sexual assaults and showed the company can still be held accountable, even if the driver’s misconduct is to a lesser degree than a rape.
“We all understand what a rape is, and that’s a very simple concept for the broad public to understand,” she said. “But something of this level — the touching of the inner thigh — that, too is a violation of one’s body and there’s a consequence for that.”
The cases are WHB 823 v. Uber Technologies Inc. et al., case number 3:25-cv-00737, in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of North Carolina, and In re: Uber Technologies Inc. Passenger Sexual Assault Litigation, case number 3:23-md-03084, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.
Read Injury Law Roundup: Freight Brokers, Uber Lose Key Cases.