Unpleasant altercation - who was the most unreasonable?

[zerofeeling]

Took my dogs out today and was trying to park in a small space between two cars on a country lane. As I was inching back to fit into the space I heard a loud crunch 😖

The two men from the car behind had just set off on their walk, as I got out of my car one of them was heading back towards me shouting why did I try to park in such a small space. I said sorry and inspected the front of his car - couldn't see any damage at all, and apart from a tiny paint scuff nothing on my car. I said to him 'i can't see any damage, it doesn't look like I hit you'
Man just glanced over at his car then asked me for my details, I asked is that necessary and said again there's no damage. He said that's not the point you have to give your details if you've been in a collision. He was much taller than me and sort of fronting up to me repeating that he wanted my details and me refusing, saying I don't think it was a collision, I think I might have hit something underneath my car. (For info my Mum and a friend have both been scammed on their insurance by people who claimed all kinds of things after very minor prangs)

Then he took an ID wallet out of his pocket and flipped it open to show a photo and badge and said he's Police. I couldn't tell if it was genuine or not. He held his phone up and said he's filming me refusing to comply with the law.
By this time the other man had come back and also filming me and I started to worry - I'm in a secluded area, with two men who are much bigger than me. I told them I felt intimidated and are they trying to scam me?

I got in my car and tried to shut the door but 1st man held onto it to prevent me. I asked if he's trying to detain me and he said no but I will if you don't give me your details, I've identified myself to you as a police officer. I said you've got no right to detain me. Eventually he let go of the door and I had to turn the car round as the lane is a dead end. Once I turned round he said again that I'm breaking the law by refusing to give my details after a collision and he started to recite the Caution they give when you're arrested! I drove away very shaken up, no idea what consequences to expect.

I’m sorry if I am wrong but I have only ever given my name, reg and insurance details I’ve never given my address and it has never been an issue. Insurers just sort it out and the police have never been involved.

Perhaps it’s because that’s what the law requires? You HAVE to give your name and address to anyone who reasonably requires it. You only have to give insurance details as well if someone is injured.

There’s also misconception about having 24 hours to report an accident to the police if you don’t give details at the scene. You must contact the police as soon as practicably possible and in any case within 24hrs. That is not the same as having 24hrs to report it.

You need to call the 'proper' police and tell them what happened

I’ve had someone run in the back of me before and there appeared to be no damage but when I got home and got my shopping out I couldn’t close the boot after. Just because there appears to be no damage doesn’t mean there is none. You need to either leave your details or report to police station within 24 hours. In your case I would have driven to somewhere I felt safe and reported the incident to the police. If possible having memorised his car registration.

I will definitely update with more detail if/when I can!

I am shocked at some of the replies here that think it's worse for a woman to leave the scene of a possible minor collision without giving her name and number than for two men (serving Police as it turns out) to intimidate and harass her.

Not your number, you name and your insurance info.

Which if youd given immediately it wouldnt have escalated.

I think potentially you were both in the wrong OP. You came on here looking for validation, not sure if you got it. You know you reversed into their car. There is no plausible explanation for the loud crunch sound and you said yourself you immediately got out and apologised - you knew what you had done. You decided there wasn't any damage but you couldn't see any visible damage. You should still have exchanged insurance details, taken photos for yourself. You decided to drive off and in your head validate your behaviour by saying you thought it was a scam. I dont think the police officers behaviour was appropriate but I think to say you were harassed and intimidated is a stretch, and of course we are only hearing your version. It's probably a good thing they recorded the exchange on their phones because it will shed light on what actually happened and was said after you reversed into their car and drove off.

This is a good example of what I just mentioned - people trying to have a go at me and excuse these men. It's a shock to see on a predominantly female site.

I’d like to thank @zerofeeling for sharing this thread with us. It raises a number of really important issues. We all drive round thinking we’re never going to crash our cars, or even knock into someone else’s vehicle.

It’s important to know exactly what we need to do, should something happen.

It’s also important to know where you stand, as a woman on your own, faced with two males who are being unpleasant. What makes this situation worse is that these men were police officers.

Unfortunately, we know that the police can’t always be trusted to act in our best interests.

If any lone woman ever feels scared and vulnerable in a similar situation to the one described by the op, then the sensible advice would be to listen to your gut and get the fuck out of there.

@zerofeeling well yes you did the wrong thing but don't seem to acknowledge that. How would you feel if someone reversed into your car and refused to give you their insurance details and drove off? I did say in my post that I don't think the police officers behaved appropriately according to your account of what happened.

Someone backed into me. I couldn’t see any damage so I let her go without taking her details. It turned out that she had damaged the the bumper supports and I had to pay to get it sorted out.

Would they have been so agressive had you been a big beefy guy?
Shitty behaviour on their part and both on a power trip, the bastards.

No one is excusing them. However your failure to take ownership of your own actions and recognise how your actions escalated the situation, is an issue, you are not the victim here. The man whose car you hit is the victim, and I can fully understand how infuriating it would be to have someone drive into my car and then refuse to give me their details would be, I imagine most people would lose their cool. If you had initially taken responsibility for your actions non of the rest of the story would have happened.

I agree with this.

I do too.

The bitch brigade are out in force, and how they would so things so differently.
OP you were there, you were scared and didn't think straight because gut instinct was protecting you to get away.
A lot of MNers would be shaking and sobbing because Waitrose had run out of their favourite chutney let alone in a situation like this. These 'I would blah, blah,' like to think they know how they would react alone in this situation with two burly strange men but the reality would be totally different.
Good for you contacting the police and getting advice, to my mind you did the right think. Make distance to safety and report it.

I'm not sure what more acknowledgement people want from me? Yes, I've had the experience of a serious collision and also a minor one where someone scraped my car outside my house. In the first case everyone involved was just really relieved that no one was injured. In the second they left a note and when we looked it seemed a minor scrape, our car isn't expensive one and I just thought, 'these things happen'. Just as well that was my reaction because the contact details on the note turned out to be fake 🙄

My issue with your posts and many others like it is the skewed emphasis - despite everything we learned after Sarah was murdered you still feel more empathy for these deliberately intimidating men than you do for a woman on her own in a vulnerable situation. Maybe you should ask yourself why that is?

You absolutely are excusing them when you claim that I 'escalated' the issue because that's not what happened.

OP, I totally support you running (and then reporting to police and insurance) if you felt unsafe. 100%.

Would you have felt unsafe if you just gave them your details as requested? I don't think so. They asked, you argued that there was no damage so it wasn't necessary. You have to provide your details, not push back because you don't see damage. This is where you escalated it and went wrong in this situation.

Taking gender out of the situation. How do you think the police would have reacted differently. Like if you had been a man, old man, young driver, etc

Driver, no gender, parking and an impact noise is heard.
Other car owner, no gender, but is law enforcement, trained in law enforcement is nearby, walks back to parking to see if it’s their car that is impacted.

Driver refuses to comply with basic accident / potential accident protocol.

All that is required is exchange of details & photos taken. If there is no damage, then insurance is not impacted. You take & have the photos.

(Never mind what “scuff” u think was there prior as you have no proof)

You were wrong, still wrong regardless of gender.

If you acted like a responsible citizen, you probably all agree no damage. But you acted erratically and against what is required and sadly other drivers were police.

You can't take 'gender' - in other words Sex - out of the situation.

I think its because based on your account your driving accident caused the interaction. They didn't approach yoy randomly, the interaction wouldnt have happened but for the "crunch" you caused that led to you inspecting the cars.

He asked for your insurance info, and you refused to give it because you couldn't see damage.

He pointed out it doesnt matter if you cant see the damage, it was a collision so could have have your info. Up to this point it was all cordial.

Then you repeatedly kept insisting you hadn't hit his car, maybe you scraped something else. You werent so intimidated you immediately fled or complied. You were happy to continue this argument with him until he identified himself as police. (Which may have been an attempt to reassure you not scare you) It wasnt until he videoed you refusing to share your info you decided he was intimidating and tried to leave.

I do agree based on your account he could have been perceived as intimidating, towards the end of the interaction, but it appears you only felt intimidated when you were being held accountable. And while I think they shouldnt have held your door I can understand how frustrating it must be to watch someone hit your parked car, then repeatedly refused to give their insurance details insisting there's no damage when they might reasonably want a mechanic to confirm that

It didn't need to be a vulnerable situation, you could have said sorry my name is and this is the car reg and insurance company and been on your way. You could have locked your door and called the police at the scene yourself. You hit them, argued with them and tried to drive off.

Sarah was murdered my someone approaching her, unsolicited posing as an officer and asking her to go with him. These men didn't randomly approach you, touch you (just your car), didn't ask for anything except your insurance which is what is usually exchanged at a collision. I dont think this is a fair comparison. I dont think its fair to have caused the accident, and then claimed youre the victim and should have been able to just drive off without giving any information because you didn't see any damage and youre 1 woman and the parked vehicle belonged to two (imo reasonably) irritated man

This is even worse. So because he didn't touch me I'm unreasonable to feel threatened by him?! Unbelievable.

Also, I didn't need to give my car reg because he could clearly see it and, having access to police database, knew that he could find my details from that so there was no need for him to try to intimidate me, hold my door etc - but he did anyway, because he wanted to.

If anyone has read the OP posts, she didn't know if these were real police or not.
ID can and is forged. She was on her own in a quiet lane with two verbally aggressive unknown males who could have been anyone.
She could have been abducted or worse, thankfully that didn't happen but there would be plenty of the righteous wetting and shitting themselves in that situation.
Own your actions? Oh, fuck off with that under the circumstances.

It’s what you said happened.