Hi... here is a story about my friend. This morning when leaving for work, my friend is backing his car up and backs right up into another vehicle. He hops out to check out the damage and sees nothing visible, he flags down a guy in a car next to the hit vehicle and asks him to check out the vehicle hit. The guy takes a close look and says, "Nah, looks fine to me, I wouldn't worry about it." My friendly (very stupidly) takes this advice, likely because it's just what he wanted to hear. And heads off to work without leaving any information. Very, very dumb move, he's aware. Later at work, he gets a missed call from the apartment complex manager. After calling back, my friend is asked if the vehicle he drives was involved in an accident that morning. He is very open and forward and says yes, and is put in contact with the owner of the other vehicle. The owner lets my friend know that a hit and run case was opened because no information was left. After work, my friend goes immediately to the guys apartment and they exchange information, the owner of the vehicle was very, very nice and says he thinks and hopes everything with the police will blow over. My friend then calls the police with the case number to give his information and make it known he has exchanged information with the driver of the vehicle, like he should have done in the first place, and awaits to be contacted by the detective on that case. My friend understands that hit and run over $200 damage is a class B misdemeanor that carries a fine of up to $2k and/or up to 180 days jail time. My friend wants to know if he definitely is going to be hit with that or if it will blow over since he got in touch with the owner and did what he should have done in the first place??? He thanks you for your advice!
The exact same thing happened to my roommate last year. Drove away when he should have left his info. The cops called him and they were about to file charges but he basically apologized, said he didn't know what to do and promised to cooperate fix everything and they let him off the hook. So he just paid for the minimal damage and left. Really its a question of how nice the other driver is.
nothing is definite. provided he has no record and a stable job, most likely he will be hit with a small fine.
im sure your friend won't be hit with those fines. off topic: my sister backed into my car a few months ago and ran. she never paid for the damages to either car. can i file a hit and run on her, since technically my parents still own both cars. so they would be filing a hit and run on themselves.
Thanks for the replies so far guys... As mentioned, the guy was incredibly nice, he and my friend actually sat around and chatted in the guys apartment for a few minutes after exchanging information, which makes my friend hopeful. What concerns my friend though is that this isn't really a matter of the guy wanting to press charges or not, seems like a hit and run would be more up to the police...
If there was no damage, it doesn't seem like the hit-and-run law would apply, since you said that it is a class B.... on over $200 damage.
Sorry, I didn't make that part clear... there was no damage visible to my friend or the guy who looked. But the owner found a scuff and also a nice shallow dent on the bumper. Unfortunately he hit probably the only $60,000 car sitting in the lot that was, until then, untouched.
I had a friend hit a car and it did some major damage to his car. Unfortunately I did not see the other person's car but it could not have been pretty. He basically left the scene and went home. His car was pretty old and it was time for an upgrade so he sold it within the next few weeks and bought a new one.
I got in an accident in the parking lot at a mall once. We were both there, but the cops couldnt do anything about it because it was on private property. They told us just to deal with our own insurance companies, which sucked cuz the lady hit me. So I don't know if it would apply. Then again maybe I just got a lazy cop who didn't want to do the paperwork for it.
