Six trucking companies have sued C.H. Robinson and TQL in federal court. The complaint accused the two brokers of knowingly sending freight to chameleon carriers, which shut down after building a poor safety record and reopen under new names and DOT numbers. The plaintiffs are Stevens Trucking, Western Flyer Express, Freymiller, IWX Motor Freight, Christenson Transportation and E.O.S.
The case was filed in federal court in the Eastern District of Texas.The complaint says the brokers “operate, control, and influence enterprises alongside Illegal carriers to funnel customer freight through non-compliant carriers,” according to FreightWaves. It alleges a pattern of racketeering involving forced labor and wire fraud, citing hours-of-service violations and fraudulent lease-purchase deals. The six carriers say that conduct priced them out of Graphic Packaging International freight moving out of Texarkana, Texas.
The complaint names Super Ego as an example of an illegal carrier network. C.H. Robinson named Super Ego a carrier of the year last year among fleets of 1,000 or more trucks. A 60 Minutes report in April tied carriers connected to Super Ego to nearly 15,000 safety violations and 500 accidents over two years.
The Supreme Court ruled 9-0 in May that crash victims can sue brokers for negligent hiring. A Dallas County jury then returned a $604 million verdict in July over a fatal Mississippi crash and assigned C.H. Robinson 23% of the fault. C.H. Robinson has said it will appeal.
“TQL and CH Robinson have lined their corporate pockets by cutting corners,” said Trey Duck, a partner at Nix Patterson, the Austin firm representing the carriers.
C.H. Robinson said it rejects the allegations. “No freight broker sets rates. The marketplace does,” the company said, adding that every carrier it works with is federally authorized and carries more insurance than the law requires. TQL had not commented when FreightWaves published its story.
