Greer Law Group, Colorado Uber and Lyft Sexual Assault Lawyer

Rideshare Sexual Assault Attorney Serving Denver and All of Colorado

You got in the car because the app told you it was safe. The app had his name, his photo, his plate, his record. You had none of it.

When a rideshare driver sexually assaults a passenger, the company’s first move is to call the driver a contractor and walk away. That answer does not survive contact with Colorado law. This is the work The Pink Advocate takes on: civil claims against Uber, Lyft and the drivers they put on the road.

The call is free and it stays confidential. 303-331-6460.

What these cases look like

Assault or groping during a ride, including on a route the driver changed without asking
A driver who locked the doors, refused to stop, or took a passenger somewhere other than the destination
Assault of a passenger who was intoxicated or asleep, including rides ordered by someone else at the end of a night out
A driver using someone else’s account, a shared account, or a rented account, so the person driving was never the person vetted
A driver who had earlier complaints against him and was still taking rides
Assault after the ride ended, by a driver who had the passenger’s address from the app
Trafficking facilitated through repeated rides the company processed and paid for

The contractor defense, and why it is weaker than they tell you

Uber and Lyft lean on one sentence of Colorado law. C.R.S. 40-10.1-602(4) says a driver “need not be an employee of a transportation network company,” and subsection (3) says the company is not deemed to own or control the driver’s car. Read what that actually says. It says a driver does not have to be an employee. It does not say the company owes passengers nothing.

Colorado imposes duties on the company itself, separate from anything the driver did. When a company breaches its own duties, its contractor argument does not reach the claim. That is the opening in these cases, and it is where the work goes.

What Colorado requires of Uber and Lyft

Background checks, and a permanent bar for sexual offenses. Under C.R.S. 40-10.1-605, a rideshare company must obtain a criminal history check before letting someone drive, and must obtain and review a driving history report. A person who has ever been convicted of a felony involving unlawful sexual behavior is barred, with no look-back limit. So is anyone with a felony involving fraud, an offense against property, or a crime of violence. A DUI within the previous seven years bars a driver, as does any felony within five years. The statute also requires the company to keep criminal check results for at least five years and driving reports for at least three. If a company says no records exist, that is worth testing.

The rules got stricter in 2026. The Colorado Rideshare Safety and Accountability Act, House Bill 26-1424, was signed by Governor Polis in June 2026, and its first provisions took effect on August 12, 2026. Under it, a rideshare company must investigate a rider’s complaint about a driver, including complaints of sexual assault, harassment and stalking, within seven business days or face penalties. A person has to review those complaints, not an algorithm. Companies must keep drivers off the app when they are using imposter, shared or rented accounts. By January 2027, background checks move from once every five years to every six months, and companies running 20,000 rides a month or more have to pay for them. By June 2028 the Public Utilities Commission must set rules for audio, video and data collected inside the vehicles.

Those duties matter to your case even if your assault happened before they took effect, because they tell a jury what the company was capable of doing and chose not to do.

There is real insurance behind these claims. Under C.R.S. 40-10.1-604, while a driver is engaged in a prearranged ride, the company or driver must carry primary liability coverage of at least one million dollars per occurrence. Uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage of at least 200,000 dollars per person and 400,000 dollars per occurrence has been required since August 10, 2022. A passenger is in a prearranged ride for the entire trip.

The filing deadline on the assault claim may be gone. Under C.R.S. 13-80-103.7, as amended by Senate Bill 21-073, a civil action based on sexual misconduct may be commenced at any time, without limitation. That covers claims accruing on or after January 1, 2022, and earlier claims whose limitation period had not already run by that date, and it reaches claims against someone other than the perpetrator, which is what a claim against Uber or Lyft is. Older claims are different. In Aurora Public Schools v. A.S., 2023 CO 39 (June 20, 2023), the Colorado Supreme Court held that claims already time-barred before January 1, 2022 cannot be revived. Tell us roughly when it happened rather than assuming either way.

Trafficking claims have a federal route. Under 18 U.S.C. 1595, a trafficking victim can sue the perpetrator and anyone who knowingly benefits financially from participating in a venture they knew or should have known was trafficking. The federal deadline is the later of ten years after the claim arose, or ten years after the victim turns 18 if the victim was a minor at the time.

Evidence the company has and you do not

Almost everything that proves a rideshare case sits on the company’s servers. The trip record with GPS breadcrumbs showing every turn and every stop. The driver’s account history, his onboarding file, his background check results. Earlier complaints against him from other passengers, and what the company did about them. In-app messages and call records. Whether the account driving that night belonged to the person behind the wheel. Dashcam footage if there was a camera. None of that is yours to download, and retention schedules do not wait for you to decide. A preservation demand sent early is often what makes the case provable.

What to do now

Screenshot the trip in the app: date, time, driver name and photo, vehicle, plate, the route map and the receipt. Do it before the app ages the record out of easy view.
Report it in the app and in writing, and keep whatever the company sends back.
Write down what happened while it is fresh, including anything the driver said.
Keep the clothes you were wearing, unwashed, in a paper bag.
Get medical care. Your health comes first, and the records matter later.
Talk to a lawyer before you give a recorded statement to the company or its insurer, and before you accept anything or sign anything.

What a claim can cover

Depending on the facts, a civil claim may seek compensation for counseling and medical treatment, lost income and lost earning capacity, and the emotional harm the assault caused. In some cases Colorado law allows punitive damages where a defendant’s conduct was willful and wanton. No one can tell you what a case is worth without reading the file, and anyone who tries is guessing.

Why survivors call Greer Law Group

Marlo Greer built The Pink Advocate around a simple idea. Someone has to be willing to say out loud what a company did, and to keep saying it after the other side’s lawyers start calling you difficult. She is a trial attorney, she speaks about this work nationally and internationally, and she does not treat a survivor like a file number.

You will talk to a lawyer. No intake script, no call center, and the conversation stays confidential.

Frequently asked questions

Can I sue Uber or Lyft, or only the driver?
Often both. The claim against the driver addresses what that person did. The claim against the company addresses its own duties: the background check it was required to run, the complaints it already had about that driver, and whether the account driving was the account it vetted.

They say the driver was an independent contractor. Does that end it?
No. Colorado law says a driver need not be an employee. It does not say the company owes passengers nothing. Colorado puts duties on the company itself, and a breach of those duties is a claim against the company regardless of how the driver is classified.

What does Colorado’s 2026 rideshare law require of Uber and Lyft?
The Colorado Rideshare Safety and Accountability Act, House Bill 26-1424, was signed in June 2026 and its first provisions took effect August 12, 2026. Companies must investigate rider complaints about drivers, including sexual assault, harassment and stalking, within seven business days, have a person rather than an algorithm review those complaints, and keep drivers off the app when they use imposter, shared or rented accounts. By January 2027 background checks must run every six months, and companies with 20,000 or more rides a month must pay for them.

How much insurance is behind a rideshare claim?
Under C.R.S. 40-10.1-604, while a driver is engaged in a prearranged ride, primary liability coverage of at least one million dollars per occurrence must be in force. Uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage of at least 200,000 dollars per person and 400,000 dollars per occurrence has been required since August 10, 2022.

Do I have to report it to the police first?
No. A civil claim does not depend on a police report, an arrest, or a conviction. A report can help, and so can a criminal investigation, but neither is required.

How long do I have to file?
For the sexual misconduct claim itself, Colorado law allows an action to be commenced at any time, without limitation, for claims accruing on or after January 1, 2022, and for earlier claims that were not already time-barred on that date. Claims that had already expired before then stay barred. Federal trafficking claims run on a ten-year clock. Call and ask rather than guessing.

Talk to Greer Law Group

Free and confidential. Nothing moves until you say so.

The Greer Law Group
2950 Brighton Blvd Suite 25, Denver, CO 80216
303-331-6460

This page is general information about Colorado and federal law, not legal advice, and reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship. Every case turns on its own facts.