Geico Gets A Chance to Defend Itself in STD Case

The Missouri Supreme Court has vacated a ruling in one of the most sensational stories of 2022, in which a lower court ruled that an auto insurance company must pay a $5.2 million settlement to a woman who claimed she unwittingly caught a sexually transmitted disease from her former romantic partner in his car which was covered by the insurer. The case is M.O. v. Geico Gen. Ins. Co., No. SC99732, 2023 Mo. LEXIS 4 (Jan. 10, 2023).

A woman, known herein as M.O. because her identity is concealed, slept with a man in his vehicle in 2017. In 2021 she discovered that she had contracted HPV, a sexually transmissible virus that can cause cervical cancer, from the man. She alleged that he acted negligently by failing to disclose his HPV-positive status to her. The lower court ruled that Geico was responsible for paying damages to the woman to the tune of $5.2 million.