Can a hit and run victim sue the car owner for not having insurance? An adult driver hit-and-ran someone who found the car later at the driver's mom's house. Her son had been driving but she owned the car. She talked to the police and gave them the insurance card, which had expired 9 months prior. If one sued the son in small claims court for the damages, could one sue her also? She has more assets so a victim could be fully paid sooner than just from her son. UPDATE 1: Jurisdiction is Bonneville County, Idaho; inside Idaho Falls city limits. Re: previous question, I didn't word it well, and some users edited it to remove information which caused answers that weren't applicable anymore. I decided to narrow the focus and try asking again. UPDATE 2: Damages are about $5k. A cop told me later that she's alo responsible for costs because she didn't have insurance, that's where I got the idea about sueing her also. I don't know if he's wrong. Idaho is an at-fault state and requires proof of $25k/$15k bodily and property liability insurance before registering a car. He lives with her and drives her car; therefore he should be on her insurance. They also check VIN every two months with a nationwide database to ensure they still have insurance. Violations include suspended car registration, license suspension, and required SR-22 insurance (expensive). Second violation is up to six months jail and up to $1k fine. The mom has court history of not having car insurance, but they've been dismissed. It's odd she didn't have card in car each time, so she either she really does forget to put in her car, or she buys a policy the same day as citation to prove to court she was insured and get charges dismissed. I think she does have insurance, but gave officer cancelled card so she only pays $75 ticket, her rates don't go up, and her son can make payments over several years. I hope by suing her with son, that I can force her to bring forth the insurance or risk a lien on her house, force sale of valuable items, etc. That's why I'm hoping to include her in lawsuit.
You can't sue her for not having insurance. You sue for the damage you suffered. You can name her as a defendant alongside her son on the theory that she contributed to the accident by letting her son use the car, and then let the judge sort out who gets landed with the liability. Depending on the rules in your jurisdiction you might have to pay her travel expenses and/or lost wages if the judge decides she wasn't to blame (and the same for her son, but that sounds like a slam-dunk). However you might be better off going for victim restitution. That way the order gets made as part of the criminal case against the son. Less hassle for you, and the state authorities are responsible for actually getting the money out of them. Edit: It turns out that Idaho has the Family Car Doctrine in its law, so the mother is legally liable for her son's accident (thanks to ohwilleke for the pointer).
Yes Assuming you were assaulted (with or without battery) and you suffered injury (physical or otherwise) during that assault you are entitled to damages. The injury has to flow from the assault but not necessarily from the assaulter. For example, if you fled across the road and were struck by a car you could sue your attacker. Because assault is an intentional tort, it is not necessary for you to prove that actual financial loss was suffered - this is not negligence. The court can assess economic loss, non-economic loss and exemplary (punitive) damages.
At this point, there is little legal recourse. Once the delay becomes "unreasonable", you might be able to sue them and get some compensation. I do not know what would constitute an "unreasonable" delay in your circumstances and I don't doubt that a month seems unreasonable. You have explained the reasons for the delay, so it's not like they are waiting around for no reason. They are not required to hire more agents to process the claim; unfortunately, they are not legally required to act in a fashion that customers like (i.e. aggressively work to solve the problem). It does sound like there is a customer-service problem, which is what reviews and the BBB are about. You can of course be on the phone with the mechanic and the insurance agency, and if things get severe you can file a complaint with the state insurance commissioner.
Legal action might be taken by the garage, because you had a contract to repair the gearbox which you cancelled (causing them some damages in time spent). You could hope that the store-owner will pay the invoice that you sent, but that seems to not be likely. The store owner can't sue you for sending him the invoice: the mechanic can sue you for not paying what the work billed for. But you do have a recourse, which is that you were acting on behalf of the store owner. I assume that you were in possession of the old gearbox, so it simplified matters if you took transported it to the mechanic, since the store owner was going to pay. In other words, you were acting as the store owner's agent: you were authorized to create a contractual arrangement between the garage and the owner. The one problem is that apparently the garage thought they were doing the work for you, and not for the owner. So they may sue you, and you may sue the owner. And suing anybody costs money. The owner is, perhaps, trying a strategy of not paying what he does actually owe, in the theory that the alternative of suing is too much time and bother (besides, it's the garage owner who would have to get the ball rolling – unless the shop owner first wants to sue to recover the gearbox). Given the information you have provided, I don't see a basis for the shop owner suing you. In order to sue someone, that person has to have caused you some damage. He could claim that he didn't authorize you to take the gearbox to the garage, or that you were negligent in making the arrangements with the shop (for instance if he said &quot;but only if they will do the diagnosis for free&quot;), in which case the court will have to decide whose story is more believable.
Check your local law. In Washington, the chapter RCW 63.21 says what you are supposed to do. The first part of the law has apparently been satisfieds: Any person who finds property that is not unlawful to possess, the owner of which is unknown, and who wishes to claim the found property Then you need to get a signed appraisal stating current market value from a qualified person engaged in buying or selling the items, or by a district court judge (I have no idea where district court judges get their qualifications to appraise bricks), then within 7 days, report this to the cief LEO where the stuff was found (and surrender it, if requested). You also have to serve written notice upon that officer stating your to claim the property. The burden now shifts to the government, which must publish notices in a local newspaper at least weakly, for 2 weeks. The notice might be publishable in a no-cost venue, in case the publication cost is greater than the value of the stuff. If the owner appears and establishes ownership, that's the end of the finder's potential interest. If the owner does not show up, the property will be released to the finder once he has paid the government's publishing expenses plus $10, but if the goods are appraised at less than publishing cost, there is no fee. As a finder, you have 30 days after that 60 days to pay required costs, otherwise it goes to the government. There are some exceptions, things not subject to finders-keepers (crab pots, secured vessels, motor vehicles, unclaimed property in the hands of a bailee). If you do not comply with these requirements, you forfeit any right to the property and you are liable to the property owner for the value of the bricks. Under the definition of theft, you have a defense that The property or service was appropriated openly and avowedly under a claim of title made in good faith, even though the claim be untenable since you presumably intend to claim ownership of the bricks under the lost property statute.
You have the right to refuse the insurance company's offer and keep your car, but that would be self-defeating. You can keep the car at the shop, and you will incur storage fees; it is possible but quite unlikely that the insurance company will change its mind and offer you more money (unless you're contending that they made a serious technical error in computing the value). The insurance company has no obligation to the shop, but they might have an obligation to you (i.e. it might be a term of the policy that they will pay storage fees up to some limiting condition). Whether or not you have to move the car or pay storage fees is between you and the shop. If I understand your idea about a signed document from the shop waiving fees, you're suggesting that they might waive the fees if you end up having to pay it, but they would stick the insurance company for the amount if the insurance company were to pay. Again, the insurance company only pays what you owe, and under this scenario, you wouldn't owe storage fees, so the insurance company wouldn't be obligated to pay. If you were on the up and up about this, the insurance company would just say "No, that doesn't work". If you were not on the up and up about the arrangement, that would be fraud.
We cannot advise you to pay the fine or contest it, but we can say that the law is. A notation like "no tag" is not the same as a formal charge that would be filed against you if you were prosecuted, under Georgia Code 40-2-8. The law says (b)(2)(A) It shall be a misdemeanor to operate any vehicle required to be registered in the State of Georgia without a valid numbered license plate properly validated, unless such operation is otherwise permitted under this chapter Hence driving with expired tags is against the law. The state indicates that the penalty for non-renewal is "10% of Ad Valorem Tax due + 25% of License Plate Fees", the latter being $20. There is also a fine of $25 for operating a vehicle without a valid county decal; you presumably know what the current ad valorem tax on the vehicle is.
The Example of Colorado Law In Colorado, a private individual who is a victim of theft can bring a lawsuit for civil theft in which a prevailing theft victim can recover the actual economic amount of the theft (including pre-judgment interest at the statutory rate from lost use of the stolen property per a separate pre-judgment interest statute), treble damages (i.e. actual damages plus twice that amount as a civil penalty), and their attorneys' fees and the costs of the litigation. Colorado Revised Statutes § 18-4-405. Rights in stolen property All property obtained by theft, robbery, or burglary shall be restored to the owner, and no sale, whether in good faith on the part of the purchaser or not, shall divest the owner of his right to such property. The owner may maintain an action not only against the taker thereof but also against any person in whose possession he finds the property. In any such action, the owner may recover two hundred dollars or three times the amount of the actual damages sustained by him, whichever is greater, and may also recover costs of the action and reasonable attorney fees; but monetary damages and attorney fees shall not be recoverable from a good-faith purchaser or good-faith holder of the property. Returning the property stolen doesn't change the fact that civil theft was committed, it only reduces the amount of the damages by the amount repaid and prevents interest from continuing to accrue. In practice, it would be very uncommon for someone to bring a suit for civil theft after they are repaid. But, nothing in principle prevents this from happening until the statute of limitations runs (in Colorado that is probably three years from the date that the theft is discovered), although there might be an argument that accepting the funds returned by mutual agreement might constitute a waiver of their claim, or might give rise to equitable defenses of estoppel or laches. Criminal Charges Of course, in the U.S., even if the company doesn't press charges, a prosecutor does have the authority to press criminal charges without their consent. A theft victim does not have the legal authority to relieve you of criminal liability for theft. There are some countries other than the U.S. where a theft victim can relieve someone who committed theft of criminal liability (if I recall correctly, Germany is one of them), but that is a minority position internationally as a legal matter (although actual practice is often different). Civil Lawsuits For Theft In Other Jurisdictions While most states do not have a statutory civil theft statute, almost every state and country would allow a civil lawsuit for &quot;conversion&quot; or the equivalent for taking property that does not belong to you for your own benefit (which is a tort). Other U.S. states and other countries would vary over whether repayment of funds converted prior to commencement of a lawsuit limits actual damages and exemplary damages based upon actual damages to pre-judgment interest, or even constitutes a complete defense, or not. Most U.S. states allow for an award of punitive damages in connection with an intentional tort (statutes of limitations and pre-judgment interest award rules vary greatly). Most non-U.S. jurisdictions would not allow an award of punitive damages in a civil action involving an intentional tort. In the absence of a statutory authorization of the kind found in Colorado, attorneys' fees and costs would normally not be allowed for a U.S. plaintiff in an intentional tort case like this one, but most non-U.S. courts would allow an award of attorneys' fees and costs to a prevailing party in a case like this one. Practical Considerations The fact that you repaid the funds makes some defenses to future civil or criminal charges very challenging. You can't truthfully deny that you repaid the funds and that comes close to an admission of guilt. But, if you state under oath that you engaged in this conduct, you make yourself vulnerable to criminal prosecution based upon that testimony under oath. In practice, one reason that the business is actually unlikely to sue you in this situation (unless they discovered that more than $50,000 was taken) is that having lost your job and paid them $50,000 you may not be able to pay even a large judgment if it was awarded against you (although such a judgment, if entered, would probably not be dischargeable in bankruptcy under U.S. law). So, the cost-benefit analysis of such a suit for the company might not make much sense. Also, while having a suit like this filed against you would certainly damage your reputation seriously in a way that could be located with a public records search, it might also moderately harm the reputation of the company which revealed that its internal controls were lax enough to make it possible for the theft to happen. In the case of a large business the damage that this could do to the fair market value of the business and its creditworthiness might outweigh the benefit it would receive from bringing such a lawsuit.