What do you do when some nob comes and tries to park in front of you and ends up gouging his dumb tailpipe into the front end of your S2K? I got a police report, contacted my insurance company (price of damages around $500, deductible is $1000), tried to contact the nob with the address that was given to me by the police/insurance - but no luck with the tracing.

This guy either gave a fake address or has moved - no one can find him!

Any advice from the legal eagles on this forum would be greatly appreciated....

 

tmkarab,

Did you get his license plate number? Driver license number? The name on the driver license?

You can track him down with either one of those...

 

That sucks man, sorry to hear it. How bad is it?

Where were you parked?

 

So you actually got an address? How about insurance information? If you got his insurance information, you ought to be able to go after his insurance company. That is assuming he was current with his payments at the time of the accident.

If, on the otherhand, all you have is an address provided by the police report (and no drivers license #, or other identifying information) and the address is wrong, you are in a much tougher position. If the address he gave is local, I guess you could go to the property and ask a manager (if its is a complex) or the current tenant, where the individual went. Of course, that has the potential of being dangerous.

None of this is terribly legal advice. Legally, if you can't find him and/or his insurance company, you are in tough shape. While its probably what you wanted to hear, I suspect you are going to eat the $500. Sorry that this happened to you.

 

I appreciate the quick responses...

I only have the name, address, and plate number - not sure if the first two are for real...my car was parked on the street - I know little taps will happen when parallel parking, but this was more than that...

I went to the address and couldn't find anyone to talk to except a very large, albeit friendly, guard dog (no need to lose a limb, right?).

The damage is just cosmetic...scrapped the hood a little and the bumper was dug into at least 3 or 4 mm at two points along the bumper (paint gone, black part of bumper showing, how hard is that to fix?) - not the end of life, but still irritating on a 5 month old car

I recently contacted the Transportation department down state and need to contact them in about a month (they are behind on there paper work) - but all they can do is pretty much what I have already tried to do - but if they find the guy they can suspend his license (but they can't get any money out of him). I really don't want that to happen - I just want my car the way it was !!!!

 

If you have plates (assuming they are not stolem) the highway department should be able to track a name and address. Additionally, although I do not know the exact sites, there are internet public records searches that can run license plates for a relatively $15-45 fee. If you can find him, write him, politely explain the situation. Wait 20-30 days. If there is no response, go to small claims court (or the equivalent, in Chicago.) Fill out a civil complaint and pay the filing fees. This will get him served. Frankly given the history, I suspect he will not show up for court, but if you get a judgement, you can put a lien on property (car, house, etc.) In some states you can garnish wages. I know this is general, but I am not an Illinois attorney and so can't get terribly specific.

If what you are looking for is some sense of satisfaction, you can also record your judgement with the credit reporting companies, which will really throw him for a loop when he applies for any kind of credit. You'd be surprised how deeply creditors frown on unsettled judgements.

But do ask yourself if its worth the ultimate time and effort.

 

thanks - I think it will be real bad karma if I go to the extremes, but I'm not sure if I wanna give up just yet...

The Highway dept. only could help me if it wasn't a city street...they said they could only help if it was a state route or the like (whatever)

maybe i'll try the internet, tried the white pages (on the web and paper version with no luck)...

thanks again for the good advice - it calms me down a bit

 

If you have the plate you have a responsible party. Go to your local police depot with you problem and police report in hand. It's illegal to provide false information on a police report......

 

Unfortunately, I can't prove if the dork is using a false name - he could have just moved and not updated his info.

Chicago police, maybe Greg Stevens can testify, are really not all that friendly...I've called them twice. First time they were rude, second time they just passed the buck to some department in Cook County (no help either). But maybe if I actually go in and say what you suggested "it's illegal to provide false information on a police report" they will look at it in a different light - who knows, I'll try - thanks