A teen in the La Grange, IL area learned it’s not a good idea to hit-and-run.
Presumed La Grange, IL resident and Redditor /u/phairphair shared dashcam footage to the /r/IdiotsInCars subreddit showing the bonehead moment a teen in her Nissan Versa backed into his 2016 Audi A7 causing thousands in damage before shiting into drive and completing her hit-and-run.
/u/PhairPhair’s thread is linked here, with a compressed copy of his dashcam video embedded below.
The incident happened outside of Duly Health and Care in the 500 block of W. Burlington Ave in La Grange, IL near Lyons Township North Campus Pool which is the high school OP hints the girl attended school at (Exact location on Google Maps is linked here.)
As you can see in this screenshot, high school students use parking all along W. Burlington Ave for several blocks, if it wasn’t any more obvious in the absence of a plate number where the hit-and-runner came from.
The dashcam video is simple enough, a driver in a Nissan Versa Hatchback can be seen reversing, presumably not paying attention, and hitting OP’s bumper on the left side corner.
As mentioned, it’s a 2016 Audi S7, a car when brand new carrying an MSRP north of $80,000. With options, these cars rolled off dealership lots north of $100,000 easily.
Embed from Getty ImagesIt’s quite obvious what happened to her classmates milling about in the background, as everyone turns to look the moment they hear car-on-car crunching.
This inquisitive football player comes over to take another look.
Quite understandably, but obviously and in hindsight the wrong thing to do, the teen books it, technically committing a hit-and-run.
“I gave the video to a very helpful Sergeant who identified and contacted the owner,” the Audi owner recounts in a comment.
Of course, it was a teen driver. You can see that the HS just let out with kids everywhere.
“I told the cops I just wanted a report for insurance purposes. No need to press charges.”
“The girl’s father called me and was very apologetic, thanked me for not pressing charges, and tried to get me to settle with cash.”
“I could almost hear the color drain from his face when I told him the damage was almost $10k. We both agreed that, on other thought, working through insurance was probably best.”
If you’re as shocked as I am, this is how much just one headlight on these Euro cars costs.
In Illinois, a hit-and-run causing more than $1,000 in damages is subject to a fine of up to $2,500 and a suspended license.
What the teen should’ve done was stop, park somewhere, and tried her best to find/wait for the owner.
To avoid a hit-and-run charge, and if OP didn’t return within a reasonable amount of time, she should’ve left her info (under a wiper or taped note of some sort) and called it in to the police.
Accidents happen, it’s what we do after the fact that and whether we learn from it that really matters.
