You can sue a trucking company for negligent hiring or training in Texas when the company's own choices helped cause the crash. A trucking company has a duty to hire safe drivers and train them well. When it skips that duty, it can be on the hook for the harm that follows.
This kind of case is called a direct negligence claim. It’s different from simply blaming the driver, because it targets what the company itself did wrong. That difference can open the door to the company's larger insurance policy.
Proving negligent hiring or training takes the right records and a clear strategy. A Texas truck accident lawyer can investigate the driver, trucking company, and maintenance providers to help you hold the right parties responsible for your losses after a wreck.
Key Takeaways for Suing a Trucking Company for Negligent Hiring
- You can sue a trucking company for negligent hiring or training when its own choices helped cause the crash.
- A direct negligence claim targets the company's actions, while vicarious liability holds the company responsible for the driver’s negligence within the scope of employment.
- Common claims include negligent hiring, negligent training, negligent supervision, negligent retention, and negligent entrustment.
- Driver files, background checks, and training records can all serve as evidence in your claim.
- Texas can split these cases into two trial phases, which changes when the company's conduct reaches a jury.
Quick Answer: Can You Sue a Trucking Company for Negligent Hiring or Training?
Yes. You can sue a trucking company for negligent hiring or training when the company puts an unsafe driver on the road, and that choice helped cause your crash.What Does It Mean To Sue a Trucking Company for Negligent Hiring?
Suing a trucking company for negligent hiring means claiming the company hired a driver it should have known was dangerous. The focus lands on the company's bad choice, not only the driver's bad driving.
Picture a company that hires a driver with three recent crashes and a suspended license. It skips the background check and hands over the keys anyway. If that driver causes a wreck, the company's hiring choice is a direct part of the problem.
That’s the heart of a negligent hiring claim: the company's own decision put a risk on the road. The same idea covers poor training, since a company that never taught a driver the basics shares the blame when things go wrong.
A truck crash rarely has just one at-fault party. Beyond the driver, the parties who can be held responsible may include the trucking company, the truck's owner, or a maintenance contractor. Naming the company opens up its resources, which a single driver almost never matches.
Common Types of Direct Negligence Claims Against a Trucking Company
The main types of direct negligence claims include negligent hiring, training, supervision, retention, and entrustment. Each one focuses on a different failure by the trucking company. These claims share one theme: they focus on the company’s own conduct, not just the driver’s actions.
A vicarious liability claim seeks to hold the company responsible for conduct by a driver acting within the scope of employment. A direct negligence claim focuses on decisions the company made before or during the driver’s employment.
Depending on the facts, these theories can help show how the company contributed to the crash.
The main types of claims include:
- Negligent Hiring: The company hired a driver despite information showing that the driver was unqualified or posed an unreasonable safety risk.
- Negligent Training: The company failed to provide training reasonably needed for the driver to perform the job safely.
- Negligent Supervision: The company failed to respond appropriately to warning signs about the driver’s performance or compliance with safety requirements.
- Negligent Retention: The company continued employing a driver despite information showing that the driver posed an unreasonable risk.
- Negligent Entrustment: The company allowed a driver to operate its truck when it knew or should have known that the driver was unlicensed, incompetent, or reckless.
How Is Direct Negligence Different From Vicarious Liability?
Direct negligence blames the company for its own actions, while vicarious liability makes the company answer for the driver's actions. Both can appear in the same case, and knowing the difference matters.
Vicarious liability comes from an old rule often called respondeat superior. In plain terms, an employer is responsible for what its employee does on the job. If a driver speeds while working and causes a crash, the company is automatically on the hook, even if the company did nothing wrong itself.
Direct negligence works the opposite way. It doesn’t rely on the driver's job status at all. Instead, it points to the company's own failures, like a reckless hire or missing training.
So why bring both? Vicarious liability is often easier to prove, so it locks in a baseline. Direct negligence can go further, since grossly negligent company conduct may support extra damages meant to punish it.
To go deeper into when the trucking company itself is liable, the two theories usually work side by side to build the strongest case.
What Evidence Proves Negligent Hiring or Training?
The evidence that proves negligent hiring or training lives mostly inside the company's own files. These records show what the company knew and when it knew it. Federal rules require trucking companies to keep a driver qualification file for every driver. That file should hold the application, the driving record, and proof of the driver’s road test.
Companies rarely hand these documents over on their own, so a Texas truck accident lawyer uses formal discovery to demand them. Once those files are open, the truth about a bad hire or a skipped training program becomes hard to hide.
Federal safety law also sets a floor that the company cannot ignore. A carrier must investigate a new driver’s past employers and obtain the motor vehicle record within the time required by federal rules.
It also must confirm a valid commercial license before allowing the driver to operate the truck. When a company skips these steps, the gap in its own paperwork often becomes the clearest proof of a careless hire.
These are the records that carry the most weight:
- The Driver Qualification File: Federal rules require this file, and it shows the driver's record, license, and test results.
- Background and Driving History: A driver's past crashes, tickets, or license problems reveal what the company could have caught.
- Drug and Alcohol Testing: Missing or failed tests can expose a company that ignored a serious red flag.
- Training Records: Logs and certificates show whether the company truly trained the driver or just checked a box.
- Company Safety Policies: Manuals and hiring rules reveal whether the company broke its own written standards.
How Does Texas Split These Cases Into Two Trials?
Texas can divide a commercial truck accident trial into two phases when a defendant files a timely request. This bifurcation rule, added in 2021, separates the issues the jury considers at different points in the trial.
The defendant must request bifurcation by the later of 120 days after filing its original answer or 30 days after the claimant adds a new claim against that defendant. When the request meets the statutory deadline, the court must grant it.
What Happens in the First Phase?
During the first phase, the jury decides liability for compensatory damages and the amount of those damages. This can include questions about the driver’s negligence and, depending on the claims pursued, the trucking company’s own conduct.
Evidence of a safety violation can also be admitted when it tends to prove that the violation caused the injury and the rule specifically applied to the defendant, employee, or equipment at issue.
What Happens in the Second Phase?
The second phase addresses liability for exemplary damages and the amount of any such award. In certain cases, a finding that the driver negligently operated the truck can allow a claimant to proceed with a company-negligence theory in the second phase.
This can include negligent entrustment when the claim depends on proving the driver’s negligence and was not already pursued in the first phase.
Bifurcation doesn’t automatically erase a negligent hiring or training claim. It changes when the jury considers particular issues and evidence. A lawyer must decide how to present the company’s conduct within that framework while preserving every claim supported by the facts.
Why Hire a Texas Truck Accident Lawyer for a Negligent Hiring Case?
A Texas truck crash lawyer can build a negligent hiring case by securing company records, connecting hiring failures to the crash, and presenting the evidence under Texas trial rules. Since much of the proof remains in the trucking company’s control, experience matters.
Digging Into the Company’s Files
Most of the proof sits in records that the company won’t readily hand over. Your attorney uses formal discovery to seek the driver’s qualification file, training records, safety history, and other documents tied to the hiring decision.
Those records can reveal warning signs the company knew or should have known about.
Connecting the Hiring Failure to the Crash
Showing that the company made a poor hiring decision is not enough by itself. Your legal team must connect that failure to the conduct that caused the crash. That link helps show why the company’s own negligence matters to the claim.
Holding the Trucking Company Accountable
A negligent hiring claim focuses on the trucking company’s conduct, not only the driver’s actions behind the wheel. A Texas truck accident attorney can develop that claim from the first records request through trial and present the company’s decisions within the two-phase framework when bifurcation applies.
FAQ for Suing a Trucking Company for Negligent Hiring
Can You Sue a Trucking Company for Negligent Hiring and the Driver at the Same Time?
You can sue both the trucking company for negligent hiring and the driver in the same case. The two claims target different wrongs, so they can run together. This approach gives you more than one path to financial recovery.
What Is the Difference Between Direct and Vicarious Liability Without a Negligent Hiring Claim?
Direct liability blames the company's own actions, while vicarious liability makes it answer for the driver's mistake. Direct claims include negligent hiring and training, and vicarious claims flow from the employment relationship. Many truck cases use both at once.
Can You Still Hold the Trucking Company Liable?
A trucking company can still be liable even without a negligent hiring claim. If the driver caused the crash while working, the company can be held responsible through vicarious liability.
A negligent hiring claim is separate and requires proof that the company’s hiring decision helped cause the crash.
Can You Recover Extra Damages in a Negligent Hiring Case?
You may be able to seek extra damages, called exemplary damages, when the company's conduct was especially reckless. These damages are meant to punish and deter, not just to repay your losses. In Texas, that question is usually decided in the second phase of a split trial.
Can You Sue a Trucking Company Instead of Only the Driver?
You can sue the company when its actions lead to a crash. Suing the company reaches deeper insurance coverage and holds the real decision-maker responsible. A single driver rarely has the resources a serious injury demands.
Reach the Company Behind the Wheel
A trucking company will point straight at the driver and hope the story ends there. It rarely does. The company's own choices, from who it hired to how it trained them, often sit at the very center of the crash.
When you hire DFW Injury Lawyers, we’ll dig into the carrier's files, expose the bad decisions, and pursue compensation for all responsible parties.
Call the Muscle today at (888) 231-1341 or reach out through our online form for a free case review.
Kevin L. Edwards
Founder
Attorney Kevin Edwards is a co-founder of DFW Injury lawyers. Over the last 15 years, Mr. Edwards has dedicated his practice to helping those who have been injured or harmed by the negligence, malfeasance, and/or recklessness of others.
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