Liability for Commercial Truck Crashes

What makes truck accidents different from passenger car accidents is that there is most likely a company that is involved. While the truck driver may be legally responsible for the accident, it does not make sense to pursue the operator individually. They do not have the insurance coverage or the assets to pay for your damages.

Instead, you would file a lawsuit or claim against the trucking company that employed the driver. The truck driver is an agent of the company for which they work. It is a principle of personal injury law that the employer is legally responsible for the acts of their employees. The legal doctrine is called respondeat superior, which is Latin for “let the master answer.”

The good news for you is that the presence of a corporate defendant means that there are deeper pockets to pay for all the damages that the truck driver caused you through their negligence. Chances are that you have been more seriously injured because of the large size of the truck. There is likely more insurance coverage to pay for these damages because the trucking company wants to stay in business. The alternative is that you can go after their assets and potentially put them out of business.

The requirement for suing the trucking company is that you prove that the driver was negligent, and that the negligence happened within the scope of their work duties. Then, the trucking company would be obligated to pay you.