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Breaking: Former Arrow Trucking CEO Pielsticker released from prison early because of COVID-19

Nearly 1,000 Arrow Trucking drivers were stranded without working fuel cards and no way to get home three days before Christmas in 2009. Pielsticker pleaded guilty to an elaborate tax fraud scheme and was sentenced to 7.5 years in federal prison in 2015.

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Former Arrow Trucking CEO James Douglas “Doug” Pielsticker has been released from federal prison nearly three years early because of a coronavirus outbreak at the Texas prison where he has been serving his 7.5-year sentence for tax evasion and conspiracy to commit tax fraud.

Pielsticker, 51, will remain on home confinement until May 2021, according to a Tulsa World report.

While at the helm of Tulsa-based Arrow Trucking, a flatbed carrier, Pielsticker stranded nearly 1,000 drivers all over the country without working fuel cards on Dec. 23, 2009.

Instead, trucking associations, rival carriers and former Arrow dispatchers worked tirelessly to get drivers home after receiving little communication from Pielsticker and other executives except to turn in their trucks at the nearest Freightliner dealerships.


Pielsticker pleaded guilty in February 2015 to embezzling millions of dollars from Arrow Trucking, which he used to pay for his elaborate wedding and purchase expensive vehicles, including a Bentley.

This is a developing story.

If you are a former Arrow Trucking driver, contact FreightWaves’ Clarissa Hawes here.


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Clarissa Hawes

Clarissa has covered all aspects of the trucking industry for 16 years. She is an award-winning journalist known for her investigative and business reporting. Before joining FreightWaves, she wrote for Land Line Magazine and Trucks.com. If you have a news tip or story idea, send her an email to chawes@freightwaves.com or @cage_writer on X, formerly Twitter.