

Uber fight to dismiss rape lawsuit shows it wont take responsibility for drivers - grej
http://thenextweb.com/insider/2015/04/07/ubers-fight-to-dismiss-a-lawsuit-over-an-alleged-rape-shows-it-wont-take-responsibility-for-its-drivers/

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h43k3r
I am very sad for the Indian Startups in this space who are facing a lot of
problems because of the rape incident involving Uber. I understand that some
things are beyond the control of these companies but incidents like this
affect the public opinion about these companies in a very negative way.

1\. TaxiForSure founders have to sell their company to Ola Cabs mainly because
of this incident.

2\. Indian Govt has banned all the mobile cab providers in Delhi, the National
Capital and is trying to enforce the country wide ban.

[1]
[http://www.livemint.com/Companies/t7TozTlZCAmvtSxog3OQ7L/Beh...](http://www.livemint.com/Companies/t7TozTlZCAmvtSxog3OQ7L/Behind-
TaxiForSures-sellout.html#nav=most_read)

[2] [http://gadgets.ndtv.com/apps/news/government-mulls-pan-
india...](http://gadgets.ndtv.com/apps/news/government-mulls-pan-india-ban-of-
uber-ola-and-taxiforsure-apps-678203)

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sokoloff
I'm having a hard time figuring out the legal theory under which Uber _should
be_ responsible for the illegal act of an Uber driver, _even if that driver
were judged to be an employee (contrary to Uber 's claims & TOS)_.

If I were to rape someone, would my employer be liable?

If I were a "legit" cab driver and raped someone, would the cab company be
liable?

If I were staying in a Marriott and got raped by a hotel staffer, would
Marriott be liable?

Same case in airbnb. Do people really think that online companies have a
higher duty of care or liability than offline equivalents?

~~~
sn3twork
I mean I can easily think of a reason in which they should be responsible.

If they weren't doing background checks on their employees, or ignoring
results from those, or not being thorough in them?

~~~
clinta
I'm not a lawyer and can't comment on if they are liable or not, but I take
issue with the idea that they should be. Adding this liability just compounds
the current issues where felons are nearly incapable of becoming employed
after serving their sentence. If the state determines that a person is safe
enough to the general public to be released from prison, why should an
employer be expected to investigate beyond that? On the flip side, if a person
is a significant threat, the state should be liable for letting them out of
prison, not the employer who hired them.

