West Seattle Crime Watch: Hit-and-run leaves crucial clue

| Crime | West Seattle news

“C” shared this story, saying it happened about 5:30 pm Friday:

I witnessed a hit and run accident at the corner of California and Myrtle. A red sedan rear-ended a SUV. He then proceeded to back away from the SUV and take off down California! (For the record, there did not appear to be any serious injuries). I pulled over, as did a few other awesome West Seattle-ites, and called 911. As I was describing the event to the 911 operator I realized that the license plate of the sedan had pulled off the car when the criminal pulled away from the SUV! The perpetrator’s plate was lying in the middle of the road! My neighbors and I gave our story to the SPD officers that arrived and hopefully they will be able to catch the guy!

We’ll do our best to find out if they actually did.

ha ha ha! August 7, 2010 (5:56 pm)

Hopefully, the hitter/runner didn’t steal the car, too. What’s the penalty for hit & run anyway?

CandrewB August 7, 2010 (6:01 pm)

Maybe the DA will even charge this one…

MarcVH August 7, 2010 (6:07 pm)

This is surprisingly common; I’ve witnessed a couple other incidents (one downtown, at 7th and Olive) where a car left its front license plate behind. They tend to be mounted in a flimsy way.

seaview August 7, 2010 (7:22 pm)

im not saying what this person did was right, but times are tough. When people are stressed in their lives (financial, what have you) they make poor decisions in other areas. if everyone could take a collective sigh & act with a bit of civility…we are all in this together. that person who hit the car & drove away may be hurting. thats all I’m saying.

Cjboffoli August 7, 2010 (7:32 pm)

seaview: Are you out of your mind?! There is absolutely no excuse to leave the scene of an accident. In fact it is a crime. Leaving the scene of an accident you caused is the height of irresponsibility and selfishness, especially when innocent people are hurt and their property damaged. If you’re too financially stressed to be responsible for crashing into someone then you shouldn’t be driving.

Concerned August 7, 2010 (7:51 pm)

Well all I’m sayin’ is there is NO excuse for hit and run of anything! Stand up and do what is right! “all I’m sayin’ “

Val Vashon August 7, 2010 (8:24 pm)

I highly doubt that the DA will charge on this one. This is almost an exact description of what happened to me a few years ago in downtown Seattle. I was traveling down First Avenue at about Pike Place Market. Yes I had been at a bar seeing some bands; I had one beer at 8:00 pm or so and this was at 1:00 am or so. Traffic was stop and go and I was rear ended pretty hard by a Honda of some sort. We pulled over and I got out of my car, my back really hurting. I was driving a real POS at the time and just wanted to exchange insurance info so my medical bills would be covered. There was a bit of a language barrier with the person who hit me; he kept pointing out the lack of body damage to my car, ignoring the fact that I could barely walk or stand. My pleas for an exchange of information went ignored and he drove off after a bit. I exchanged info with the person I hit with the front of my car after being hit from behind, and then realized that the other guy left his front plate behind. Disoriented and and a little scared of the club crowd that was wandering around Belltown, I drove home and called the cops when I got there. They came out the next morning and took a report and the license plate. The investigating officer knocked on the RO’s door a grand total of once and didn’t get an answer so he closed the investigation. The RO’s/drivers insurance company settled with mine (perhaps they called the cops to get the RO’s name, I don’t know) and I got a fat check plus months and months of chiropractic visits paid for.

Which was nice, but criminal charges would have been a good idea, too. All I can say is don’t expect much to come of this. That’s why people run after hitting somebody.

Val

visitor August 8, 2010 (1:24 am)

seaview, nice to see a compassionate person here. I think it’s not uncommon that the first impulse is to run…..often, though, even those who run will come back. (reminds me of Kohlberg’s theory of moral development > first stage is behaviour by fear – that someone noticed or saw what happened) Moral outrage is meaningless without understanding #1 and compassion #2.

miws August 8, 2010 (6:53 am)

seaview, what if the driver of the SUV is struggling financially? Just because a vehicle is described as an SUV, doesn’t mean it’s a 2008 or newer Land Rover. It could be a 20 year old Jeep Cherokee.

So, yeah, to the victim of this crime, to the victims we read about here on WSB of car break-ins/thefts, home burglaries, assaults, smash-n-grab the small business’ cash register, let’s just…..

“take a collective sigh & act with a bit of civility…we are all in this together.”

psssst…..seaview……not all perpetrators of crime have hit hard times. Some are actually quite well off, apparently. Think Totem Pole thief.

Mike

bridge to somewhere August 8, 2010 (7:50 am)

If you cannot afford insurance, do not drive. Period.

Smitty August 8, 2010 (8:20 am)

Seaview – it’s Bush’s fault.

Alex August 8, 2010 (9:39 am)

I agree with Val, he won’t be charged. SPD don’t care for this type of case. I won’t bore you with the details, but I’ve had two experiences like this in my life where a guy drove off after an accident, but I had witnesses, a full description, license plates, paint from his car on mine, etc etc.

In both cases the other guy got off scot free.

It’s quite simple: the cop goes to the perpetrators door and asks “excuse
me, did you hit a car yesterday?” the guy says “nope.” and then the cop says “ok, sorry to bother you sir.” Case closed. No charges.

Evidence, and the blatant obviousness of guilt won’t matter. Bottom line, nobody is going to court over a few piddly thousand dollars in damage. That’s why hit and run works so well, and people get away with it 99% of the time.

DownOnAlki August 9, 2010 (9:27 am)

A car hit me on the west seattle bridge – you know who you are convertible mustang down on Alki – and left because “he had somewhere to go”. That is what he told the policeman who investigated after I filed a report. Nothing happened as far as charges being filed against him, of course – even though we had pictures and paint transfer. The worst is that my four day old son was in the car as we were on our way to the pediatrician for the first time. What goes around……..

GAnative August 9, 2010 (10:01 am)

We were recently rear-ended by a motorcycle on 405 in stop and go traffic (mostly stop). We pulled over and so did the car behind the motorcycle but the motorcycle took off. We got the license plate number and called the police.

The officer was very nice but told us that:
*motorcycles don’t have to have insurance so we probably wouldn’t get anywhere with a claim
*to proceed with hit and run charge we would have to be able to identify the driver but he was wearing a full face helmet so that’s out
*to put in a claim on our insurance would most likely raise our rates

So there is nothing to do but for us to pay to have the car fixed. Yea!

Jason Epstein August 11, 2010 (9:56 am)

Love to see how helpful you and some of the other West Seattle-ites were in this situation!

Any car accident is difficult to deal with, but hit and run crashes add a whole new level of barriers to overcome. Getting the license plate is a good start, even if the police don’t pursue the at-fault driver. This accident will be more about recovering damages for the car, and injuries (although it appears from the post that injuries were thankfully avoided).

As a Seattle car accident attorney, I have had plenty of clients who were in a hit and run situation. As Val Vashon was saying in a previous post, criminal charges don’t have to be made in order for the victim to get compensated for their damages. I have some helpful information in a book on Washington auto accidents that you can find by clicking on the preceding link. Hope the info in there can help some of you out if you ever find yourself in that horrible situation!

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