I was surprised to learn that a recent analysis of of fatal trucking accidents revealed that 25% of truckers involved in fatal truck accidents had been convicted of a criminal offense, that 14 percent had prior drug or alcohol offenses before the accident and that 10% were convicted felons. This is apparently occurs because trucking companies faced with a shortage of experienced drivers find that ex-convicts are an attractive pool of low cost labor. Some states such as Texas are training inmates to be truck drivers upon release.
Upon looking into this further I found that it is legal to hire drivers with a criminal records. While I am in favor of people rehabilitating themselves and becoming productive members of society, this alarming statistic demonstrate that if companies are going to hire drivers with criminal records that their performance must be watched closely by the trucking companies. Maybe they should work for at least a year with an experienced driver with a good safety record and be assigned trucks with more sophisticated tracking systems so that there speed and hours of service can be tracked to make sure they are not driving recklessly in violation of hours of service regulations or speeding.
