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.

He could have simply taken the number plate and given that to his insurers who could have tracked her and her insurers down.

OP well done for standing up for yourself. An unfortunate situation turned into a horrible one because of the behaviour of men who have been trained to know better. I hope it works out for you.

They will already have your name and address from your number plate if they are real policemen (though I doubt that many people have false police id in their pockets!)
Whats done is done so now you need to minimise the damage.

I've looked back but can't see anywhere whether you've told your insurers, you MUST do this right away. Tell them the truth
Then sit back and let them deal with it, thats what you pay them for.

Somthing similar happened to me, no damage to my car but over £1000 to his. Hi was previous damage and be was trying to get his car fixed on my insurance

Why should he have do? The law is there for a reason, to be honest all this talk about not wanting to give details to strangers etc is ridiculous.

How about you STOP DRIVING INTO PEOPLE'S CARS/PROPERTY, then you WON'T have a legal responsibility to do anything and can go about your days with no problems whatsoever.

Acting a victim when it is YOU that has caused a collision is an absolute joke.

Learn to drive and park properly and you won't ever have this problem.

Those saying that he could track her by the number plate are missing that the car might be on cloned or false plates. As he's a policeman he would be very aware of that

Oh my word. I am so sorry for you and I hope you are ok. It doesn't matter what you did / didn't do and how you reacted at a stressful time. no one deserves the grief you have had on here and it's been really horrible to see.

Crikey.

Do you really think that you don’t need to fill in paperwork given to you by a police officer about a crime you’ve committed?

Are you certain that the police officer who delivered you to letter was the owner of the car? If the other bloke owned the car he’s done absolutely nothing wrong. If you’re right it was his car then there’s probably an argument he should have had someone else deliver the form but that won’t help you much.

Refusing to provide details in an accident is a crime. There’s a video and two police witnesses. That’s the problem you want to focusing on right now.

I understand why you felt intimidated, and as we know he WAS actually a policeman, he should´ve know how to handle the situation more intelligently. And yes, we all know the type who is on a power trip.
A woman drove into the back of my car many moons ago, not fast and heard that tell tale crunching sound, and when we got out and inspected there was no outward damage, but i told her that I wanted her details anyway as there could be internal damage to the bumper area. I went to the car to pick up pen and form and she drove off! Saying there was no damage. I wasn´t quick enough to get her plate. Yes there was substantial damage internally to my bumper, the mechanic told me that the next hit would have gone straight "into the kitchen" as bumper was useless. I had to foot the bill myself. I was young and naive. Now i whip my mobile out, record car and number plate and then ask for details.

I would just for your peace of mind, it sounds horrible

If they were false plates then don't you think the driver would lie about their name and address?

Yes, it is. The RTA clearly states that if either party at the scene has a reasonable suspicion that there has been a collision - regardless of any damage, apparent or otherwise - and asks the other party for their insurance details, it’s an offence under the Act not to comply. You yourself must have had a reasonable suspicion of collision because you stopped the car after the crunching noise and got out to investigate. There was a scuff on your bumper that you’re not sure was there before or not, and the other party asked you for your details. Whichever way you look at this you were wrong. You stayed long enough to argue with these two men. It would have been quicker to give your details, take photographs of the two cars and leave if you felt intimidated.

I don't understand why so many posters can't seem to grasp this despite it having been mentioned repeatedly from the very start of the thread.

I can't help but wonder if they'd be happy with their GP giving them a glance up and down and saying "you look fine to me. On your way, no need for any further inspection". 🤔

And then she would have been in trouble for leaving the scene without giving her details.

I think that women should trust their instincts and stay safe as opposed to following the letter of the law. Not least as it is perfectly possible to inform the police and insurance afterwards so it truly is a victimless crime.

This is what people are not understanding here. I don’t actually think this policeman has done anything wrong by printing off a form and hand delivering it. When someone has refused to exchange details at the scene the police investigating the incident can print out something called a Collision Worksheet and with it, a notice requiring the production of documents like insurance details at a police station. If the car belonged to the other bloke, then the officer hasn’t done anything wrong in delivering the documents, together with the envelope with which to return them. How stupid does OP think someone would have to be, to put their own name on the return envelope if what they were doing was likely to get them into trouble.

What is the worst case scenario if you leave the scene of a trivial collision without giving details, and then inform your insurance and the police later (but pretty soon)?

What is the worst case scenario if you choose not to trust your instincts and stay in a scenario where a man is making you feel very unsafe?

So you’re happy for people to pick and choose which bits of the law they do and don’t want to comply with ?

How did the OP know the man was the owner of the car and not just some intimidating asshole who saw an opportunity to scare a lone woman?

If he even was a real policeman then on behalf of his profession, he needs to recognise and understand why trust has so completely broken down between women and the police, that OP feels safer committing an illegal act than complying with the law. Sarah Everard is etched on all our consciousnesses forever.

I've name changed for this because I'm a magistrate and this thread reminded me of a case I once sat on. A woman was charged with drink driving and failure to provide a breath specimen. Sounds bad, right?

Facts of the case were that she had driven her car to the pub intending not to drink but ended up drinking enough alcohol that she knew she would have been over the limit. During the course of the evening she had an argument with one of her party, stormed out of the pub and went and sat in her car, in the driver's seat, with the heater on (it was December and now dark) to call her partner to come and pick her up.

One of the men who had been in the pub at the same time as her saw her go out to the car park on her own and he followed her out there. As she was sitting in her car waiting for her partner, he went up to her car, opened the door and demanded she get out.

Terrifying right? So she drove off out of the car park and round the corner to a more well-lit and busier road.

The man was an off-duty police officer. He followed her outside suspecting that she was going to drink drive. Since sitting in the drivers seat of a car when over the limit is enough for an arrest, he took it upon himself to go over and scare the wits out of her by shouting at her to get out of the car. He claims he identified himself as a police officer but the woman was scared and didn't believe him and just wanted to get away. As soon as she drove off, he called his mates and they went and found her and nicked her.

Because it was a statutory offence we had to convict her. But as a bench of all woman that day, we all mentioned in our deliberation how much we sympathised with her and how terrifying that must have been for her, on her own, in a dark pub car park, with a male stranger opening her car door.

The fact that the policeman seemed oblivious (if we're being generous to him) as to how his actions would be experienced by a lone female, suggests that the police need to have a hard look at themselves.

As a woman, I would always prioritise getting to safety rather than get into any kind of altercation with an aggressive male.

I think one thing that has been made clear here.. if those two men hadn't actually heard the 'loud crunch' and come walking back then there is no way she would have left a note with her details on it!

She would have just left, or parked elsewhere and pretended not no know anything about it, I wonder how many other cars she's dinged with her shit parking over the years.

im with you OP. I think the whole idea of handing name and address is outdated and I wouldnt do that either, I would give name phone number and reg. However, in these circumstances, if the police officer was that bothered that you were breaking the law, then the sensible thing to do would have been to take your reg and report it to his supervisor. They could have then dealt with it and arrested you should that have been the correct thing to do over this. Instead, he intimidated a lone woman in a secluded area and thought that was appropriate, then went back and looked up your car reg himself and hand delivered a letter to your house.

Im a lover of the police, my brother is one and I think they have the hardest job in the world. Dickheads like this one are the ones that give the police a bad name.

Even if you had massively pranged his car and refused to pass on details, he knows he could pass on the car reg and two police officers who were there would have been credible witnesses to what happened.

Why didn't she just lock the door then? There was absolutely NO reason why she would have had to move her car at all, what an utterly stupid defence.

Why did she not go to a different area of the pub to ring her partner?

I know someone who reversed their car in a pub car park while drunk and killed someone walking out of the pub, he went to prison as he rightfully should. I'd rather a woman be 'scared' by an off duty policeman, who announced who he was to her, than she actually drove her car and potentially killed someone.. he was right to assume the worst and approach her IMO.

As a woman, I would always prioritise getting to safety..

And both these women (OP and the woman you are referring to) in their cars, with lockable doors and their fully working mobile phones, were perfectly safe. ESPECIALLY as both times, the men in the story had announced themselves as policemen and were both in fact, policemen.

No. Not generally,

"then went back and looked up your car reg himself and hand delivered a letter to your house."

Do we know this has happened?

It seems unlikely the police would be able to confirm which officer accessed her details. This would be a GdPR breach surely?

For example here is an alternative scenario

He reported a failure to stop and got given a crime number.

Using this crime number, the op's details were looked up by a colleague who dropped off or arranged for the forms for the op to complete and return. She has been asked if she has seen the actual officer on CCTV / doorbell camera but I don't think this has been answered.

The op has called in to to a police handler but will this have been allocated to the same incident , particularly as she took some time to report it?

That's terrible, the poor woman! I don't know how long ago it was but since the tragedy you mentioned the police in our area have a set protocol to follow (which I cited earlier in the thread) - in my case the man didn't follow that - if he had I would have felt reassured and the whole mess could have been avoided.

So every time we find ourselves in the wrong with a male police officer in attendance we can just say "ahhhh, Sarah Everard....gotta go!"

I don't think one policeman committing a murder really changes anything tbh. Presumably the other 103 men that murder women every year aren't policemen, so in theory it's safer if it's a policeman rather than a member of the general public.