How to get hit by a drunk driver with no insurance and not get screwed

In My Humble Opinion
1

My mom was driving home from “town” after going grocery shopping yesterday evening. She lives about an hour and a half from what most folks would consider the civilized world, out in the N. California mountains.

About 10 minutes into the drive home, while navigating the skinny, curvy, one lane paved road through a patch of Redwoods in her beloved F250, she sees this beater of a truck come careening around a sharp corner and skid sideways across a small bridge toward her. My mom had enough of a split second to stop the truck, but not enough time or space to avoid getting slammed into by a drunk woman driving said beater, along with her drunk passenger, but without insurance.

Luckily, no one was hurt, but mom’s truck is probably totaled. There was a witness who pulled up behind Mom just as the whole thing unfolded. Mom called 911 with his cell phone.

The drunk passenger decided his best option was to just start walking down the road. The drunk driver, decided her best option was to try and start her truck and try to drive away. It started, but wouldn’t move, so she was still around to be arrested when the cops showed up.

My mom is still making the last few payments on her F250, which she bought off of a lot, used, 3 years ago, for about $12k. I just looked it up on Kelly Blue Book and in “excellent” condition, it is worth about $7500. It was in “good” condition prior to Ms. DUI Dumba$$.

She had uninsured motorist coverage, but looks to be quite possibly screwed out of a considerable amount of transportational value once the dust has settled.

Her insurance company is Hartford, through AARP, and so far they have been treating her very well. There is a small chance that they’ll consider the truck repairable, but mom highly doubts that.

Should she contact a lawyer? The idiot who hit her is likely not to have any resources or assets to go after.

2

Didn’t include the last sentence…

Will getting a lawyer ensure that the insurance company stays on the straight and narrow?

3

A lawyer will take 1/3 of the settlement she gets from the insurance company.

Which, in a straight-forward case like this, will be pretty much the same amount she would have got without a lawyer. So she’ll be out 1/3 of her money.

Don’t get a lawyer unless you have a definate need.

4

Kelly Blue Book is a sales tool, nothing more. Insurance companies use the NADA guide, which almost always has a lower price. “Thousands below retail” is the automotive versions of “New and improved”.

Having said that, so long as no personal injury is involved there’s not much reason to give one third to a lawyer. Now should your mother wake up one morning with “Soft Tissue Injury” then she’ll want to get Dewey, Cheatum, & Howe on the case.

5

Not having been raised in a litigious family, it wouldn’t have occurred to me till the last few years to say this:

Mom should have gone straight to an ER for Xrays and an MRI. Even if it cost her out of pocket. Because, the phrase a personal injury lawyer loves to throw at a plaintiff is

I sat on a jury in a personal injury lawsuit. That was a phrase the defendant’s attorney used. More than once. Really cut to the quick.

Mom should be seen, Mom should take home images of all XRays and MRI images. And, I pray Mom is okay and this is precautionary.

She doesn’t need a lawyer. If her truck is badly mangled, the local MADD chapter might wanna shoot some photos of it, though.

6

We were hit by an uninsured motorist last year.

We got fucked.

You can’t get blood out of a turnip, as they say. The drunk lady’s life will be severely complicated and expensive for quite a while. If she’s working, you can try to get her wages garnished, and the insurance company will let you know when they’ve exhausted all possibility of collecting monies from the perp. Then you have to sue independently (at least that’s how it goes in Illinois).

If the perp doesn’t have any money, suing will cost you money with no return.

Sometimes life just sucks.

7

Begin now looking for comperable f250s. If the insurance company offers a settlement that is less than what they are going for, you are armed with better information. Use your agent, make it clear to your agent that you have done your research, and hopefully they’ll fight for you.

8

Yes, you can’t get blood out of a turnip. You can, however, get a lot of turnip juice.

She could make sure she’s there when this drunk’s case comes up in court and try to make a statement to the judge prior to sentencing. I’m not an attorney, and confess I don’t know if this is even allowed in your state, but that’s all you got to go for and you’re feeling vindictive for all the crap this POS have put you through, it could be an option.

9

IF! :wally

If you’re feeling vindictive…

10

Thanks everyone.

Neither my mom or I are anywhere near vindictive. There is no personal injury angle. Aside from the fact that the truck was heavily damaged, mom was at a full stop and neither mom or the truck even moved as it was being smashed.

I just hate the idea of mom getting screwed out of her decent, reliable truck. But she would’ve been in pretty much the same boat if she’d hit a deer, or an insured motorist, or swerved into a redwood tree to avoid some drunk idiot walking down the middle of the road.

“I was forced to stop my vehicle and endure 3 seconds of witnessing an unavoidable collision that smashed up my vehicle but left me and everyone else unharmed” isn’t exactly emotional hardship material. It just sucks.

Today she caught a ride back “into town” with a family friend to pick up a rental car. I echo’d NurseCarmen’s advice to price some comparable trucks for sale in the area so she’ll be prepared when the insurance company starts throwing figures around.

Alerting M.A.D.D. is another good idea, though I’m not sure if there is even a chapter close enough to send someone to take a picture.

I don’t think mom would take the opportunity to speak to the judge even if it was indeed an option. The potential consquences of this woman’s actions that (thankfully) didn’t happen far outweigh what did happen, and that’s what should be on the judge’s mind.

Vehicular value depreciation never ceases to :confused: . You buy a truck that’s 7 years old, has 80,000 miles on it for a bluebook price of $12,000. You drive it for 3 years, put 40,000 miles on it, and it’s “value” is more than cut in half. The subjective discrepancies between parties perceiving worth just hurts my head.

11

Honeydewgirl, first off, let me say i’m glad your Mom was okay and she sustained no injuries, after all, vehicles are material thing and are replaceable, your Mom is not…

that said, i have NO pity or compassion for Ms. inebriate, she made a concious decision to drive while intoxicated, she has to pay for the results of her actions, if that means garnering her wages or suing her, well, sucks to be her, she didn’t have to drive drunk, she made a concious decision to do so, knowing the risks and penalties involved

if she either waited a little longer before getting in the car (average metabolism of alcohol is about an hour per drink), or, here’s a novel idea, DIDN’T DRINK when she knew she was going to be out on the road, she wouldn’t have smashed up your Mom’s truck

the very rare times i have a drink, it’s always at home, and it’s late in the evening, when i know i won’t need to get behind the wheel, DUI is not worth the risk…

on a side note, about a year or so ago, i decided to perform an experiment to see how much i’d have to drink before i became impaired…

i popped in my copy of Gran Turismo 2 into my PS2, loaded up a stock Dodge Neon ACR (i drive a bare bones Neon), and performed a couple laps on the High Speed Ring track, noted my times, then cracked open a beer, downed it, and raced the track again…

i started to show impairment at about 1.5 beers, my response times dropped dramatically, and i started pinballing off the guardrails in the corners…

so i safely found out what my limit before impairment was, and that i can’t hold my liquor worth a damn…

there’s no way i’ll drink alcohol if there’s the remotest chance i’ll need to drive somewhere…

i hope your Mom takes Ms. Inebriate to the cleaners, she’s gotta pay for her poor judgement…

12

I’m gonna have to chime in and vote “screwed”. I got hit last year, bitch crumpled my hood and one front panel, smashed my headlight and broke the grill…and because the repairs cost more than the blue book the insurance company called it totalled and refused to give me any more than blue book value of the car for repairs. The rest of the money came out of my own pocket. Plus the frickin’ deductible. I even talked to a lawyer about it. I was totally screwed. I got lucky that later her insurance company admitted the fault was hers, but 6 months later they still haven’t paid me back. Fu**ers. Since the other driver doesn’t even have insurance, your mom won’t be that lucky.

13

Jeez, what timing. On Thursday evening my brother totalled his pickup truck. There was no other driver involved- he skidded on the wicked ice that was coming down in Philly that evening around and just after dusk.

He hit tall highway type light pole so hard- going no more than 30, as he was just moving up onto a merge into Easton Road off Limekiln Pike ( near Beaver College, for those in the know ) that the lamp on the street light snapped off and dropped, landing square in the bed of his truck. It weighs over 100 pounds. Had it hit the cab, he’d be dead. His airbag did deploy on his side. ( He was alone in the truck ). I haven’t seen the photos yet, he says the truck almost split in two.

The truck is 6 years old, and was totalled yesterday by his adjustor ( who arrived while Bro was there at the impound yard, getting stuff out of the cab, picking around the shattered glass, etc.). He met the adjustor who said ( before seeing the wreck ), so you hit bad? Bro said, uh yeah. Adjustor apparently said, well I’ll just see what we’re going to do here, ok? They walk back, the guy takes one look at it, looks at my brother and shakes his head and says, You got away with some slightly fractured ribs? God. Yeah, it’s totalled. You’ll have a check in a week.

I’m grateful my Bro got away with those mildly injured ribs. Coulda been really bad. His truck is so worthless, that he’s basically fucked as far as reliable transportation now. -sigh-

On the side of the OP that concerns drunk drivers, don’t get me started. As a retired EMT I’ve seen plenty of them. Alive, dead, walking away when others have died or been severely injured. If there is a Hell, they’re going there and their eternal pennace will be to clean up the broken pieces of their victims over and over again… :mad:

14

I was in an accident with an uninsured driver with a suspended license (not drunk.) I actually hit him, since he pulled out of a driveway right in front of me. I had some front end damage. I definitely did not get screwed. Got it fixed with uninsured motorist, and wound up not paying a penny. (I use State Farm.) When the other party to an accident has a suspended license, the cop is really on your side.

So I hope your Mom gets her money.

15

I have to update the thread with the latest from my Mom.

They totaled out the truck, cutting Mom a check for about $7,500, a chunk of which paid off the remainder of her payments.

But, it appears things have taken a turn for the best:

16

May I suggest writing to your legislators and urging them to draft a no-fault insurance law? Ours (Michigan’s) works great. You pay your own insurance and they pay you regardless of fault or if the other driver is insured. If you aren’t more than 50% responsible for the collision, they don’t even raise your premium.