Went to the Blackhawks game last night and on my way back with my girlfriend got caught at a red light about 4 blocks away from her place (roughly 11 pm). We were sitting there talking and all of the sudden i heard and felt a crack. Fortunately, nothing serious, no apparent whiplash or anything so i was happy about that. normally i would not have gone into a story about a situation like this but this was rather interesting.
Obviously at this point, i was the victim of an inattentive driver who failed to see the red light and my big car sitting in front of him. So i set the parking break and walked out of the car approaching the black Jeep Wrangler. Inside was a white male, about 30 years old or so. As i started approaching his car (which was on my bumper), he immediately asked me: "Excuse me, how much have you had to drink tonight?" This came as a bit of a surprise considering i was stopped when he hit me and after a second i answered - nothing. He seemed a bit disappointed with that answer but immediately again with a threatening voice prompted me: "well, i hope that this is true because we are gonna pull over right now and i will call the cops to make sure that you are correct!"
That irked me quite a bit but of course i thought to myself, ok, so he calls the cops and then what, even if i was drinking (which i wasn't) he is gonna tell them that he rear ended me while sitting at a red light because i was impaired?
We pulled over and he went into explaining to me that there really is no damage to the car blah blah. From previous experience, I of course figured, i need to see the car in the light and have a professional determine that there is no damage and told him that i needed his insurance and DL. he complied with the DL but had no insurance card and gave me his agent's name and cell phone number (i hope).
So the moral of the story is that while conversing with him, my gf and I realized that this guy was heavily impaired and obviously drunk. At some point, i ended up asking him his original question: "how much have you had to drink?" his response: "None of your business Mr. Officer." This guy was good and i will use his line of questions if i ever get into a fender bender in the future. it is quite good actually, he knew he was drinking. he hoped i had been drinking. obviously regardless of fault if i had been drinking i would have gotten a DUI so i was drinking i would have no incentive to sit and wait for the cops... genius actually...
At this point i had looked at the bumper and gotten all the info i thought i needed (including a picture of his DL) and debated between couple of options:
1. Take all the info and deal with it later.
2. Call the cops and wait for them to show up, write the accident and maybe give him a DUI.
3. Let him go, and then call the cops and report him as a drunk driver.
I chose number one. didn't really feel like dealing with it. What would you have done?
From the pics it is really hard to see the damage as the paint was really not cracked. from close inspection it is evident (shown in the big box) that the bumper plastic is cracked. Also, i have some marks left on the bottom of the bumper where circled...
What would you have done (got rear-ended last night)
