Evidence after a commercial vehicle crashThe company keeps the records. We request them.

This page is for people hurt in a crash with a vehicle driven for a business, and for families after a death. It covers the records that exist, how long each must be kept, and California law on lost evidence. It does not cover fault or insurance, which have their own guides: can I sue the company and whose insurance pays. Our Los Angeles commercial vehicle accident lawyer page covers the whole claim.

The company on day one

A business whose vehicle is in a serious crash starts with an insurer or claims administrator, adjusters, safety staff, investigators, and lawyers. It also has the vehicle's telematics, cameras, logs, and dispatch history. For a motor carrier, a crash with a death, an injury treated away from the scene, or a tow-away is an "accident" under 49 CFR 390.5T. 49 CFR 390.15(b) requires the carrier to list it in an accident register, with copies of required accident reports, and keep that register three years.

Evidence by vehicle size

The vehicle's size decides which rules apply, and the rules decide which records exist. Federal safety rules reach a vehicle of 10,001 pounds or more used in interstate commerce, under 49 CFR 390.5T. That includes a California leg of a shipment that starts or ends outside the state. A commercial driver's license, and with it federal drug and alcohol testing, starts at 26,001 pounds under 49 CFR 383.5.

California carriers that stay inside the state have used electronic logging devices since January 1, 2024 under 13 CCR 1213, with exceptions that include vehicles built before model year 2000. A private company van of 10,000 pounds or less with no hazardous load is outside both the federal and the state hours rules. Its evidence is the company's own GPS, phone records, delivery scans, and timesheets.

Federal retention periods

These are minimum periods from the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations, current eCFR text up to date as of September 29, 2026. A carrier may keep any record longer.

The short periods cut both ways. A request in the second month reaches logs the carrier must still hold under 49 CFR 395.8(k)(1); a request in the seventh may not. Maintenance and testing records under 49 CFR 396.3(c) and 49 CFR 382.401 run longer, so a later request is still worth sending.

California retention periods

California's Title 13 rules cover the trucks the Highway Patrol regulates, and they track the federal periods closely.

One difference matters after a crash. 13 CCR 1215(e) says: "If no defect or deficiency is discovered by or reported to the driver, the report(s) shall so indicate." Federal rules require no report when the driver finds no defect, so a California intrastate truck should have a signed report for the day of the crash either way. The record periods are in 13 CCR 1234, and Vehicle Code section 34505.5 keeps 90-day terminal inspection records two years.

Electronic data sources

Electronic data answers how fast, how hard the braking, and where the vehicle was. Each source has a different holder, and only the electronic log has a required keeping period.

An electronic logging device is an hours log, not a crash recorder. Under 49 CFR 395.26, it records the date, time, location, engine hours, miles, and driver and vehicle identity at each change of duty status, and at least once an hour while the vehicle moves. Speed and braking come from the engine module, telematics, or cameras.

Camera video has no keeping rule at all. Amazon's Camera Technology Notice for its delivery partners says the in-van cameras record "the vehicle interior" and "external views including to the front, right, left, and the rear of the vehicle." It adds: "Footage that is not uploaded remains encrypted and is automatically overwritten." Fleets differ. The UPS and Teamsters national agreement says "Vehicles may not be equipped with inward-facing cameras" and requires backing camera systems in all package cars.

Amazon's privacy notice for drivers also lists "Route data, including when you pick up and deliver parcels," and names accident investigation and legal proceedings among the uses of its data. A request to both the delivery company and the network reaches both sets of systems. Our Amazon delivery van guide covers that network.

Event data recorder access

An event data recorder keeps data from the moments just before and during a crash, such as speed. The federal standard, 49 CFR Part 563, covers only vehicles built on or after September 1, 2012 with a weight rating of 8,500 pounds or less and an unloaded weight of 5,500 pounds or less, and only if a recorder is installed. Walk-in van-type trucks are excluded.

Vehicle Code section 9951(c) bars anyone but the registered owner from downloading data from a recorder installed by the manufacturer, unless the owner consents, a court orders it, or a narrow research or repair exception applies. For the company's vehicle, that means its consent or a court order. The first request is to keep the vehicle and its data unrepaired until a download can be arranged.

Post-crash drug and alcohol tests

Federal drug and alcohol testing applies only to drivers who need a commercial driver's license, under 49 CFR 382.103, so most box truck and van drivers are outside it. For licensed drivers, 49 CFR 382.303 requires a test after any crash that kills someone. After an injury treated away from the scene or a tow-away, it requires one only if the driver is cited, within 8 hours for alcohol or 32 hours for drugs.

An alcohol test not given within two hours needs a written reason, and attempts stop at eight hours. Drug test attempts stop at 32 hours, with the same written record. Records of those decisions are kept two years, so whether the driver was tested has a documented answer.

Police reports and truck supplements

The police report is the first neutral record. Vehicle Code section 20012 requires the agency to disclose the entire report to people with a proper interest, including any named injured person and an attorney who represents them. The report lists the registered owner, which for a rented or leased vehicle can be the rental or leasing company rather than the driver's employer.

Larger vehicles add the CHP 555D truck and bus supplement. It is required for a vehicle of 10,001 pounds or more, a placarded hazardous load, or a bus seating more than nine, in a crash with a death, an injury transported for treatment, or disabling damage. Under the form instructions reproduced in the San Diego Police Department collision manual, the officer enters the "carrier name/address, phone number and all carrier identification numbers." A van under 10,001 pounds gets no supplement, so photographs may be the only record of its markings.

For major collisions, the Highway Patrol's Multidisciplinary Accident Investigation Teams include a Motor Carrier Specialist responsible for "conducting in-depth mechanical inspections of involved vehicles." The teams handle major collisions, not every crash.

Inspection and safety history

Part of a carrier's history is public. The federal SAFER company snapshot lists 24 months of inspections, out-of-service rates, and crashes, which it lists "without any determination as to responsibility." FMCSA's Safety Measurement System warns: "Readers should not draw conclusions about a carrier's overall safety condition simply based on the data displayed in this system."

Carriers keep roadside inspection reports 12 months under 49 CFR 396.9(d)(3), and the Highway Patrol publishes California terminal inspection results through its carrier inspection search. Our find the company behind the vehicle tool looks up a USDOT number, an MC number, or a company name.

Company business records

49 CFR 395.11 requires supporting documents for a driver's hours: bills of lading, dispatch and trip records, expense receipts, fleet management messages, and payroll or settlement records, up to eight per driver per day. No carrier or driver may "obscure, deface, destroy, mutilate, or alter" one. Together they show where the driver was told to be, and when.

Contracts, vehicle leases, and rental agreements show how the companies connect. Under 49 CFR 390.21T(e), a truck rented for 30 days or less may show the rental company's name and USDOT number, and the agreement carried in the truck must name the renting company. For carriers covered by the federal insurance minimums, 49 CFR 387.7(e)(1) makes proof of that coverage public "upon reasonable request by a member of the public."

Outside video and witnesses

Store cameras, doorbell cameras, and other drivers' dashcams can show what the company's camera did not. No rule requires their owners to keep video, so a written request naming the date, the time, and the camera's location is the way to ask. Witnesses named in the police report are easiest to reach while their phone numbers still work.

Log and GPS conflicts

When a driver's log and GPS disagree, the first comparison is inside the log, which records its own location. The second is against the supporting documents kept "to verify on-duty not driving time" under 49 CFR 395.11(c)(1). Fuel receipts, tolls, dispatch messages, and delivery scans each carry their own time stamps.

A gap can be innocent. During authorized personal use of a truck, the log records location only to about a 10-mile radius under 49 CFR 395.26. A gap can also mean the log was changed. 49 CFR 395.8(e) forbids a "false report in connection with a duty status" and tampering with the device, and 49 CFR 395.30(f) bars the carrier from altering or erasing the original hours data or "the source data streams." A request therefore names the original records, not only the final log.

The driver and the company then explain the difference in a deposition, which is sworn testimony taken before trial. Our hours of service guide covers the driving limits the records are measured against.

Lost evidence in California

Spoliation is the destruction or loss of evidence a party should have kept. In Cedars-Sinai Medical Center v. Superior Court (1998) 18 Cal.4th 1, the California Supreme Court called intentional destruction of evidence "a grave affront to the cause of justice." It held there is no separate tort claim against a party to the case when the loss is known, or should be known, before the case is decided. The remedies stay inside the case: a jury inference, discovery sanctions, attorney discipline, and criminal penalties.

Evidence Code section 413 lets the jury weigh a party's "willful suppression of evidence." CACI No. 204 tells jurors: "You may consider whether one party intentionally concealed or destroyed evidence. If you decide that a party did so, you may decide that the evidence would have been unfavorable to that party." It "should be given only if there is evidence of suppression."

Code of Civil Procedure section 2023.030 allows money sanctions, issue and evidence sanctions, contempt, and terminating sanctions. Subdivision (f) bars sanctions, absent exceptional circumstances, for electronic data lost through "the routine, good faith operation of an electronic information system," and says it does not "alter any obligation to preserve discoverable information." In our view, an overwrite after a request that named the system and the dates is hard to call routine, so each request names both.

In Williams v. Russ (2008) 167 Cal.App.4th 1215, the Court of Appeal affirmed dismissal of a plaintiff's entire case after he let most of his own client file be destroyed during the lawsuit. The party seeking sanctions first shows that the lost evidence had "a substantial probability of damaging" its ability to prove an essential element, and the burden then shifts. Penal Code section 135 makes it a misdemeanor to destroy evidence knowing it is about to be produced in a trial or investigation.

Your own evidence

Those rules bind injured people too, as Williams shows. Keep your phone, your photos, any dashcam card, and the clothes you wore. Photograph your vehicle on all sides before any repair or salvage, and tell us before an insurer takes a totaled car.

Preservation requests

A preservation request names each item of evidence and asks each holder to keep it: the operating carrier, its insurer or claims administrator, the driver, any owner or rental company, the delivery network, and the tow yard. It asks for preservation, not production. Our post on the evidence preservation letter explains what it names and what it does not do.

Exceptions to this guide

• You were driving for the same company. An employee hurt on the job starts with workers' compensation; see our post on work crashes and third-party claims.
• A city, county, or state vehicle hit you. The evidence is the same, but a claim for injury or death against a public entity must be presented within six months under Government Code section 911.2(a). See our government and postal vehicle guide.
• A private person was moving house in a rental truck. The CHP truck supplement classes that trip as not in commerce, and most carrier records on this page will not exist. The rental agreement and the rental company's maintenance file still do.
• Someone in your family died. The evidence is the same. Who may bring the claim is covered in fatal commercial vehicle crashes and who can file a wrongful death claim.

Next steps after the crash

After a commercial vehicle crash, the evidence exists, and most of it sits with the company on a schedule set by rule or by software. The next step is a list: every name and number on the vehicle, the tow company, the agency and report number, and any camera you saw. We build the preservation requests from that list and track the deadlines for the claim. There is no fee unless we recover.