On Thursday night one of our police units was rear ended by a new driver, who just got his license issued a month ago. The damage was minor and there were no injuries, which was good.
The driver was understandably nervous while I did the interview. After I was done I wrote the report number on a card and told him to call his insurance company.
He said, “What do I do now?”
“Call your insurance company and tell them what happened. Give them the report number and let them worry about it.”
“OK, but what do I do now?”
“Call you insurance company and let them know what happened,” I said again.
“But I have so many questions.”
“It was just an accident. Don’t worry,” I said.
I explained to him a couple of times that his insurance company would handle everything from here on out.
The male, who was from Saudi Arabia asked, “Am I going to jail?”
“No, it’s an accident. You can leave now. Just call you insurance company.”
“Do I have to die now?”
Where did that come from? It was something from way out in left field and I never saw it coming. Apparently this guy was really stressed out over this. After some reassuring words and some jokes he started to relax. I then wondered how they handled traffic collisions where he was from.
I told someone, “They must be really take traffic enforcement seriously over there.”
In the end, we shook hands and he actually started to smile. He went up to the officer and apologized for hitting him. That’s when I said, “Since you hit him, you need to give the officer knuckles.”
The officer and the driver gave each other a weird look at first like they weren’t sure what to do. With some encouragement from me, they held up their hands and did a fist bump. It was worth watching because it was awkward and downright funny.
Sometimes you just have to have fun out here.
Badge415 