CHICAGO — A split state appeals panel delivered a victory for app-based ride services like Lyft, saying state law protects the ride services from the kinds of personal injury claims that might be aimed at cab companies.
In an opinion issued Sept. 30, the Illinois First District Appellate Court answered questions Cook County Circuit Court Judge Patricia Sheahan certified as part of a lawsuit brought by a woman who said a Lyft driver raped her in 2017. The woman sued the driver, Angelo McCoy, as well as Lyft and Sterling Infosystems, which conducts background checks for drivers.
The woman argued that even if sexual assault falls outside the scope of an employment relationship, Lyft owes its passengers the same standard of care as a taxicab or bus company. But Lyft pointed to the Transportation Network Providers Act, which stipulates its drivers “are not common carriers, contract carriers or motor carriers, as defined by applicable state law, nor do they provide taxicab or for-hire vehicle service.”
That prompted the woman to challenge the TNPA as unconstitutional because it violates a state law ban on so-called special legislation - meaning a law intended to benefit only one specific group at the expense of another. She also said the General Assembly rushed the bill to a final vote.
Sheahan dismissed the vicarious liability claims without prejudice, then determined the TNPA doesn’t arbitrarily distinguish between common carriers and rideshare apps because the law, beyond attempting to protect passengers, has an additional stated goal of enabling growth of such companies in the state. She also said although lawmakers didn’t give the law three readings on three different days, the voters were “uncommon” but not “disallowed.”
However, Sheahan left open the possibility there could be a different theory of vicarious liability allowing the woman to recover damages. That prompted two questions for the appellate panel: Does the TNPA fully preclude a company like Lyft from being subject to the same highest duty of care as a regular cab company? And, if so, is the law itself constitutional?
Lampkin wrote that without the relevant TNPA section, “Lyft and other (transportation network companies), like traditional taxicabs, would be deemed common carriers.” But the law is clear, she continued, and although the passenger pointed to other instances in which school bus operators were found liable for drivers’ sexual assault, the panel noted the unique vulnerability of young students and disagreed with “the proposition that any provider of transportation services that exercises a high degree of control over its passengers’ safety must be held to the same duty of care that applies to common carriers.”
After determining the TNPA is unambiguous in its position that rideshare companies are not common carriers, the panel further explained lawmakers’ choice to make that distinction wasn’t arbitrary. Lyft drivers are not allowed to pick up a rider except through the app, which means passengers have different information about their driver than they do when hailing a cab, Lampkin explained. She said lawmakers “could reasonably determine” those unique safety features and service method “make the imposition of such liability unnecessary for the protection of passengers.”
Gordon opened his dissent by clarifying his agreement on the understanding of the TNPA’s common carrier definitions, but he rejected the majority’s stance on the constitutionality of the law. He noted the passenger who filed the suit wasn’t challenging the entire law, only the specific exemption from common carrier liability.
“There is no rational basis for treating a TNC differently than a taxicab with respect to the duty owed to its passengers,” Gordon wrote, adding the law “treats TNCs differently than any other entity that would fall within the definition of a common carrier.”
That lawmakers chose to regulate TNCs differently from taxis isn’t relevant, he continued, explaining the issue is the exemption itself and the way it deprives relief to crime victims. He said taxi operators largest expense tends to be liability insurance — despite “no relevant differences in the circumstances under which a passenger takes a rideshare as opposed to taking a taxicab” — and the TNPA “not only fails to assure legal, social, and economic justice, it creates an unjust result to the victims of sexually predatory drivers who use the services of ridesharing companies relying on their advertisements that they will have a safe ride.”
The plaintiff has been represented by attorneys J. Timothy Eaton, Jonathan B. Amarilio, Allison E. Czerniak, and Ioana M. Guset, of the firm of Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP, and attorneys Timothy S. Tomasik, Patrick J. Giese, and Patrick M. Grim, of Tomasik Kotin Kasserman LLC, both of Chicago.
Lyft has been represented by attorneys Anthony J. Carballo and Martin Syvertsen, of Freeborn & Peters LLP, of Chicago, and Beth A. Stewart, of Williams & Connolly LLP, of Washington, D.C.