Personal Injury

By Steven A. Lopez | Personal Injury Attorney, San Antonio, Texas

The App Shows You a Rating. It Doesn't Show You What Uber Already Knew.

Every Uber ride starts the same way. You open the app, see a name, a photo, a star rating, and a car. That's it. That's all the information you get before a stranger picks you up and drives you somewhere alone.

Uber knows more. Uber has always known more.

That gap, between what the app shows you and what the company already has on file, is now the foundation of one of the largest personal injury litigations in the country. As of August 2026, more than 4,300 sexual assault lawsuits against Uber are consolidated in federal multidistrict litigation in the Northern District of California, In re: Uber Technologies, Inc., Passenger Sexual Assault Litigation, MDL No. 3084, before Judge Charles Breyer. That number passed 3,500 earlier this year and hasn't slowed down since.

I want to walk through how this case got built, because it says something important about how personal injury law actually works. It's rarely about a single bad moment. It's about proving a pattern, and proving that a company knew about the pattern and did nothing.

How Plaintiffs' Attorneys Got Inside Uber's Files

Lawsuits don't usually come with a window into a corporation's internal files. Companies keep that information locked down, and they fight hard to keep it that way.

Discovery changes that. Once a lawsuit is filed and moves into the litigation process, both sides have to hand over relevant records, whether they want to or not. In the Uber MDL, that meant plaintiffs' attorneys got access to complaint logs, driver history files, and internal safety data that Uber had spent years keeping out of public view.

A 2025 investigation by the New York Times added to the picture, reporting that Uber's internal teams minimized or disregarded safety features that would have protected riders, and that the company's public safety reports understated the true number of misconduct complaints it had received.

Put those two things together, discovery records and investigative reporting, and you get a clearer story. Uber wasn't blindsided by driver misconduct. Uber had complaint histories on drivers. Uber had patterns. The lawsuits argue the company used that information to manage its own risk and public image, not to protect riders before something happened.

What the Litigation Has Already Shown

The first bellwether trial in the MDL started in January 2026. In February, a jury returned an $8.5 million verdict for the plaintiff. That was the first time a jury put a dollar figure on what it costs Uber when a court finds the company failed to protect a passenger.

More bellwether trials are moving through the system now, including one transferred to the Western District of Texas for trial logistics while it stays part of the broader case. Texas cases are part of this litigation. This isn't a story happening somewhere else.

The 9th Circuit also confirmed that Uber can't force these claims into private arbitration or block survivors from joining the consolidated case. That matters. Arbitration clauses buried in terms of service have shut down a lot of consumer claims over the years. This ruling kept the courthouse door open.

What Texas Law Actually Requires From Rideshare Companies

Texas doesn't leave rideshare safety to a company's discretion. Texas Occupations Code Chapter 2402 governs transportation network companies operating anywhere in the state, including here in San Antonio and across Bexar County.

Section 2402.107 is specific. Before a company like Uber can let someone log in as a driver, it has to run a local, state, and national criminal background check, including a check against the national sex offender registry. That background check isn't a one-time formality either. The company has to run it again every year for every active driver.

The lawsuits in the MDL aren't really arguing that Uber skipped a background check on day one. They're arguing something narrower, and honestly more damning. They're arguing that once a driver generated complaints, ones that never resulted in a criminal conviction and never showed up on a background check, Uber had that information internally and kept the driver active anyway. A criminal background check only catches what's already in the system. Rider complaint histories catch what isn't. The lawsuits argue Uber had both and acted on neither.

If This Happened to You in San Antonio

If you were sexually assaulted by a rideshare driver here in San Antonio, whether you were picked up near the Medical Center, downtown, or out along Loop 410, you have a real legal claim, separate from anything happening in the criminal system.

A criminal case, if one gets filed at all, is about punishing the driver. A civil case is about holding the company accountable for the decisions it made, or didn't make, before you ever got in that car. Those are two different systems with two different purposes, and you don't need a criminal conviction to pursue the second one.

Texas gives you a specific window to act. Under Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code Section 16.0045(b), adult survivors of sexual assault have five years from the date of the assault to file a civil claim. Five years sounds like a long time until you're living through the first year of it. The earlier a case gets built, the easier it is to preserve evidence and get records from the company before they get harder to reach.

What I'd Tell You If You Sat Down in My Office

I'd tell you this isn't your fault, and I'd mean it. I'd also tell you that the same discovery tools that built the MDL against Uber nationally are available in an individual South Texas case. Your attorney can request the same categories of records: complaint logs, driver history, internal safety communications. You don't have to be one of thousands of plaintiffs in a federal MDL to get access to what the company knew.

Every case is different, and I'm not going to pretend a blog post can tell you what your specific claim is worth or how strong it is. That conversation happens in a consultation, not in an article. But I can tell you the legal framework exists, Texas law requires more from these companies than a single background check, and courts around the country are starting to agree that "we didn't know" isn't holding up as a defense anymore.

FAQ

Can I sue Uber if my assault didn't result in a criminal conviction?

Yes. A civil claim doesn't require a criminal conviction. Civil and criminal cases have different standards of proof and serve different purposes. You can pursue a civil claim against Uber even if the driver was never charged or was found not guilty in a criminal case.

How long do I have to file a lawsuit against Uber in Texas?

Under Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code Section 16.0045(b), adult survivors of sexual assault generally have five years from the date of the assault to file a civil claim.

Is the Uber sexual assault MDL a class action?

No. MDL No. 3084 consolidates the cases for shared pretrial proceedings, like discovery, but each plaintiff still has an individual claim and receives an individual outcome. You don't lose control over your own case by having it connected to the MDL, and you can also choose to file a separate case in Texas rather than join the federal MDL directly.

What does Texas law require before a driver can log in to Uber?

Texas Occupations Code Section 2402.107 requires transportation network companies to run criminal background checks, including a national sex offender registry check, before a driver logs in for the first time and then again every year. It does not require companies to act on internal rider complaints that don't result in a criminal record, which is the gap these lawsuits are built around.

Do I need to live in San Antonio to work with a San Antonio attorney on an Uber assault case?

No, but Texas law will generally govern claims involving assaults that happened in Texas, including anywhere in the San Antonio and Bexar County area. Working with an attorney familiar with Texas' statute of limitations and TNC regulations matters more than where you happen to live.

 

If a rideshare driver assaulted you in San Antonio or anywhere in Bexar County, you don't have to figure out what Uber knew on your own. Call my office for a free, confidential consultation. Every conversation stays private, and you decide what happens next.