No Good Deed ...

Goes Unpunished ... according to Outlaw13 ...

My daughter unit and I were right behind a highway collision between two vehicles recently. On a freewway, one vehicle stopped in the right lane, and started backing up because it had missed an exit. A vehicle following behind didn't recognize what was going on until it was too late - it swerved to the left, but hit the left rear corner of the backing vehicle. One vehicle was doing at least 65 - the other a negative 5 or so (relative to the other vehicle). The collision was pretty violent, sending the following vehicle spinning a hunred yards or so across two lanes of traffic.

We stopped and rendered aid to the 'backing up' vehicle. By the grace of God, no one in either vehicle was injurred, though they were badly shaken. Lady driving 'backing up' was shaking, and entering shock. We calmed her, kept her still (in case she was injurred), and kept her talking and alert until the police/fire showed up (about 15 minutes). After they arrived, they extracted lady from her car, police officer took a short statement, and we were dismissed. The officer did thank us for renderring aid - nice of him.

We did not approach the other vehicle - another motorist had stopped and rendered the same type of aid to them as we did.

OK, so we did our good deed. No big deal, no one got hurt.

Fast forward two days.

I get calls from two different insurance companies, telling me I need to give them a recorded statement. Not asking, TELLING. I go ahead and comply - though they were, in my opinioin, rude, I thought it was a civic duty. In both cases, the insurance companies refused to identify which party they were representing.

I then get messages from two lawyers offices, stating that I need to call them immediately to give recorded statements. OK, that's enough of this bullshit. Both of the drivers did stupid things that caused the accident, and they are both lucky to be alive. I am damned sure not going to help either one of them sue the other. BTW, neither lawyer's office would identify which one was their client.

The moral to this story ... a couple actually.

First - anytime you give your contact info to the police, you are guaranteed it will become public record when the police report is filed. Lawyers, insurance companies, people involved - they all get your information to do with as they please.

Second - even though it is the right thing to do, don't expect anyojne you help to actually thank you. No one involved with these calls ever said thank you, or that their client wanted to express their thanks for risking ourselves, our vehicle, and taking our time to lend assistance to them.

In any case, I hope lady of Indian descent (backing up) finally learns how to drive in this country. It ain't safe out there with idiots like that on the loose ...