Arkansas carrier says ‘nuclear verdict’ forced them to close

An Arkansas-based trucking company closed for good this week, citing a multi-million dollar “nuclear” lawsuit that reportedly made it impossible to secure insurance coverage.

Little Rock, Arkansas-based RCX Solutions Inc. said on March 2, 2020, that they’ll be closing down for good. The company informed employees about the closure last week.

The company employs around 33 truck drivers, according to the FMCSA’s SAFER website.

RCX issued a statement explaining the reason for their company closure:

Over the last 5 years, we have been battling a lawsuit involving another carrier we let pull one of our RCX trailers that caused a major accident. Unfortunately, we were wrapped up in a lawsuit which we lost a $23 million dollar verdict. We appealed the ruling in 2017 and lost the appeal last summer. They did, however, lower the amount to $7.5 million. Things like these nuclear verdicts are killing the industry and forcing thousands of carriers out of business. After working a deal to satisfy the judgment, I thought we had this behind us. This past week we were renewing our Insurance and I was working with our bank on our credit line for insurance. The judgment for 6.5 million is still hanging out there and will for another year. Due to this judgment, we were unable to secure financing for our upcoming insurance.

So after 10 years and a lot of blood sweat and tears. I will have to shut the RCX division down. I want to assure you that your service will not change. We will be moving many of the loads through our MPV division. For those of you who use drop trailers, we will replace them with MPV trailers or one of the partner carriers. We also will be using many of the same partner carriers that you all have worked with in the past with Sunset. This has been one of the hardest decisions I’ve ever had to make. To have a company taken away for something that wasn’t your fault is very gut-wrenching. I am happy to say we were able to find good homes for many of our owner-operators and company drivers with many of our partner carriers.

I want to say “THANK YOU ” to all our customers, vendors, and the greatest bunch of employees and owner ops I’ve had the privilege to work with.

RCX Solutions was founded in 2001 and provided a variety of van/flatbed, long-haul, and regional transportation services.