The ride-sharing giant, Uber, has been dealt a legal setback by a unanimous Illinois Supreme Court that sided with the widow of 60-year-old rider killed in a 2022 crash along the Stevenson Expressway.
The question at the center of the case was whether a family member of a deceased rider would be forced into third-party arbitration to settle a wrongful death or severe injury claim, rather than hashing the issue out in the courts.
In its registration process, Uber requires every user to agree to mandatory arbitration to settle any potential claims against the company.
The seven-person high court ruled Gloria Sheridan Geller, acting as a representative of the estate of her late husband, Mark Geller, is exempt from that requirement and can sue Uber for damages. That’s despite Gloria Sheridan Geller also having agreed to the abitration clause as a registered Uber user herself.
“Because [her] agreement applies only to disputes arising from her own use of Uber’s services and because the estate’s wrongful death claims arise solely from Mark’s use and accrued only upon his death, no clear and unmistakable evidence exists to conclude that the parties agreed to … an arbitrator,” wrote Justice David K. Overstreet in the court’s opinion.
Uber did not return WBEZ’s requests for comment.
On April 19, 2022, Mark Geller was riding in an Uber when 51-year-old driver Ejaz Rathore lost control of the vehicle, striking a fixed object along Interstate 55 in Chicago. Both men were taken to hospitals and pronounced dead, according to Illinois State Police.
Geller’s widow, on behalf of his estate, nearly a year later filed a nine-count complaint in Cook County Circuit Court, arguing that Rathore was negligent and that Uber was “vicariously liable.”
Uber argued for the case’s dismissal, saying Geller’s widow also agreed to arbitrate disputes when she checked the “I accept” box on the Uber app’s user agreement page “in the same manner Mark did.”
The company reported 153 motor vehicle fatalities nationwide between 2020 and 2021, according to Uber’s most recent safety study.
The safety of ride-sharing app users has sparked national attention in recent years.
Last week, an arbitrator ordered Uber to pay $40 million to the parents of a 23-year-old passenger who was fatally struck by oncoming traffic after her driver pulled over to the shoulder of a highway in Southern California.
And since the app’s popularity skyrocketed, Uber has faced mounting lawsuits alleging sexual assault and misconduct by drivers against users. That same report found 2,717 incidents across the most serious categories of sexual assault and misconduct that year.
A coalition of victim advocacy groups, including the Illinois Coalition Against Sexual Assault, had filed an amicus brief in support of Geller’s widow. In their brief, the group argued for the end of forced arbitration, saying victims were “less likely to succeed, and received significantly lower awards, while the secrecy of arbitration perpetuated a “culture of silence.”
Per the court’s orders, the wrongful death case will now proceed in the circuit court system.
Mawa Iqbal covers state government and politics for WBEZ and Illinois Public Radio.