So today at about 3:00pm I'm heading southbound on Rte 28 taking a left onto Frying Pan road (by Dulles Airport). For those of you that know the area, there are two left turn lanes.

I'm in the inside left turn lane, a huge Ford Winstar Van is in the outside turn lane. What does he do? Before he even gets to the light, cuts across into my lane taking the turn at a supersharp angle. I hit my brakes hard, my passenger and I both admitted we think we were screaming - I thought he was going to push me onto the median which I was afraid was going to flip my MINI. Somehow we make it around the corner to Frying Pan Rd. and the guy takes off!

One thing I have to admit - after nearly 15 years of driving a stick when someone runs into you, you have a hell of a time figuring out what gear to be in. I jam it into some gear and chase after him (needless to say, I catch up - Frying Pan is two lanes at this point). My boyfriend in the passenger side rolls down his window and starts shouting at the guy to pull over. I end up cutting in front of him (yeah, stupid thing to do, but adrenaline was rushing) to get him to pull over, which he finally does.

The guy gets out of the van, and starts shouting "no englais! no englais!", well, I was a little upset and started shouting at him "habla driver's license? habla insurance?". He kept saying "tourist, tourist". Meanwhile, a woman is yelling at him from the van and kids are shouting out the windows... what a mess. I told my boyfriend to keep him there while I called my insurance company. Kudos to State Farm for answering the phone on a Sunday afternoon and telling me I needed to call the police.

Fairfax county police showed up in less than 3 minutes (wow). Though I told them I needed someone who spoke spanish, the police officer that came out spoke minimal spanish. Turns out the guy had no passport (the police officer kept asking him for one), but had an expired VA driver's permit (he lied to the cop about having this until my boyfriend pointed out he saw what looked like a virginia driver's license in his wallet when he originally pulled out documents for us while we waited for the police - boy, the officer got upset about that since the guy said he was "only visiting, tourist"), the van was registered to someone else, and the insurance card in the other person's name that he showed us was no longer valid!

The good news? The only damage (that I know of) to my MINI is a scruffed passenger side black "bumper" above the wheel well, and scuff marks on the tire. The smell of burning rubber really lingers, though I guess it was from me standing on the brakes. The officer said he could see the other guy was clearly at fault, but he was considering it a "non-chargeable accident", and wasn't going to file a police report, whatever that means. He said we could probably easily buff out the damage and not have to submit it through insurance. He gave me a copy of the form he had the guy fill out and told us to go on our way, while he ordered a pick up for the van. So, we drove off.

So - if anyone could provide assistance on the following two things:

(1) I think that since the police considered it a non-chargeable accident, doesn't that mean I won't be able to submit any damage claim to my insurance? Or would it have to be under my comprehensive coverage? Like if I backed into a tree or something? What does that mean?

(2) Should I take my MINI to MINI of Sterling or a local body shop to get an estimate to see if it is even worth submitting it to my insurance? Or should I call my insurance back first to see what they recommend? The smell of burning rubber was horrible - I think I might have damaged my brakes, too, or something else besides the obvious body damage.

Any advice would be much appreciated!

 

Sounds like what the Officer is referring to is a "No fault" accident. You could take it into your insurance company for an estimate - just to see what is WOULD cost of you decide to file a "No fault" claim versus just paying out of pocket.

Ashburn Collison is who MINI of Sterling recommends for their work. I can vouch for their excellent work as we were rear ended in our 02' and Scooter looked brand new when we got her back...

Sorry to hear about what happened. Here on the West Coast, it happens all the time unfortunately. LOTS and LOTS of drivers from across the border that are in the same situation as what you described.

So did the Cops do ANYTHING to the driver? I mean, come on, no insurance, expired everything......geez.........really burns me...urggggg...

Donna

 

I guess this is why there is "uninsured motorist" coverage.
It's like subsidized insurance. We pay for them.
Good luck getting it fixed.

 

Grrr! Non-fault?! The police officer clearly indicated that the other driver was at fault! Dang. I knew I should have demanded an accident report! Maybe I'll go all CSI on it and take pictures of the skid marks that I *know* I must have left in that intersection.

Thanks for the reminder about Ashburn Collision. I knew I had seen it mentioned on these boards before. It looks like the black side panel (sorry, I know some people out there are cringing... I don't know the technical term for them!) seems to be able to pop off - maybe this would be an easy fix to have it just simply replaced. I'll call them tomorrow.

Thanks again to my MINI for making me feel safe - even though I had that huge van towering over me and cutting me off right before the turn - he really did take care of me! My boyfriend finally got to use the (what he calls) "oh **** handle" for the real thing, instead of just holding on to it like a pansy during some of my on and off-ramp fun (anyone ever take the on ramp to Rte 28 northbound from Hwy 50? niiiiice).

 

Talk to your insurance company for guidance and also get an estimate done by them. You can always choose to not have them pay for it if you'd like to take care of it yourself later, and they may be able to help rectify fairfax police. You could also call the police dept, and speak to a supervisor or leiutenant.

 

loxycoon, those plastic pieces are supposed to be easy to replace, you'll need a set of new clips as well as the actual plastic trim. My guess is that, if that turns out to be the only damage, you'll be far better off replacing it out of your own pocket than trying to recover any sort of compensation from the idiot that hit you, or risking having your insurance rates jump (or making it more likely in the future). Good luck!

Apparently being an illegal immigrant pretty much exempts someone from any sort of harassment by johnny law, plus they don't have to bother with a driver's license, insurance, registering their car, paying taxes, or all sorts of other tiresome busywork. I think I'm going to look into changing my status, and work on my "no ingles!" act.

 

geez..call the INS..report this. No passport or green card? I assume you have the license plate #? The cop did nothing?? This kinda crap really burns me up

 

I don't think the officer was implying no-fault. Just nothing he could charge for. However, given the ODs legal situation I think you'd be better off playing the lottery than expecting him to have insurance.

Contact your insurance agent ASAP and turn over all the information you have. Let him or her earn your premium. They'll pursue the ODs insurance, if that comes up as non-existant, then ask if you'll be penalized for filling on your uninsured motorist policy.

I wouldn't say that the cop wasn't doing anything, sounds like the van was impounded and while he didn't write up a ticket for the accident there's no way to know if he was written up for expired DL or whatever else might turn up in the van.

 

First and only accident I was involved in was in VA. At that time (some years ago) the police would not even come to the scene if the cars were driveable, not blocking traffic and no one was injured.

I got an report of the accident filed, but it did not indicate who was at fault or make any statements that the information in the report was correct. It just basically said "It was reported to us that this happened." This ended up being enough for my insurance company with a witness statement to make the other driver's insurance pay.

 

Sorry about your accident. I live just down the road and this kind of burns me up. Most of us jump through hoops to do the right thing, and then you have people, that try to leave the scene of an accident, drive without a drivers license, drive without insurance, and lie to a police officer. Yet it doesn't seem to ever go against the people that cause the problems. I was hit not far from there a few years ago by a young 18 year old girl that clipped me as she sped by me and changed lanes too soon. We had to get her to stop, and she started yelling it was our fault, and that she was in a hurry and had to leave. I called Fairfax police 4 times to get them out there, I actually flagged one over for help, but he said that call went to another cruiser and left. Once they showed up, they found the girl was driving on a suspended license, and her insurance situation was the same. When stuff like that happens, I'd love to see handcuffs and action being taken, but they give you an info form and let you handle your own problem Sorry to rant, but I feel for you, and I hope it all works out for you.
Also, good panic stop and chase down technique

 

Bad luck must be in the air. In addition to the dent and scrape I got on the driver's side about two weeks ago, someone keyed my car yesterday :-( I'm a nice guy, really! WTF?!?!?

Luckily, the key-ing was done on the same panel where the scrape is so the whole thing will be repainted.

As for insurance, you can claim anything, but your premium might go up a little bit come renewal time.

At the end of the day, it's just a car... :-) Hang in there.

 

Thanks everyone for the tons of help, sympathy and advice!

I updated my main State Farm insurance office with the information from the accident. Seems that since the officer didn't ticket the driver with "failure to stay in lane" or some other offense, it might actually be a no-fault or even my fault accident! She suggested I call him and find out if he ticketed the guy after I left.

But luckily - I took the advice to take my MINI to Ashburn Collision before I called the officer. Wow, what a shop even though it may look like someplace you'd never want to be caught after dark! When I called on the phone, they said they had an immediate opening for someone to take a look at it if I could come over right now. So I drove over, and Scott looked at my MINI, and wrote up an estimate. I even heard him on the phone trying to get the part in as I waited! (he wasn't able to, but I was in no real rush). Highly recommended at least for customer service!

So.... grand total for parts and labor? $35.00! I can't believe it, I thought MINI parts were going to be very expensive. All he needed to do was replace the black bumper-guard thing... luckily that is all that was damaged. So those things definitely DO serve a purpose! May all my accidents be this cheap!

Yeah for a happy ending! Even if the illegal immigrant guy DID probably get off scott free from all of this...

 

Actually, I've gotten nothing but flack on this from my boss and co-workers. They seem to be very concerned that the driver would have pulled a gun or something on me. I admit driving the guy down and forcing him off the road was not the best thing to do.... If it happened again, I'm not sure what I would do.

Probably too many years of driving in NYC (thank god, not in my MINI). You pick up waaaaay too many agressive driving habits from living/driving there.