You may be surprised to hear that choreographed car accident scams are a real thing. After all, don’t most people want to avoid vehicle collisions, not intentionally cause them? If you were recently in a wreck and felt that something was not quite right about it, you could be correct. It may never have crossed your mind to think that the other driver is actually pulling a scam on you. The con artist is hoping that you will cooperate with them, and may be so strategic about their sneakiness that you would never know otherwise. But here are a few indications that the accident you were involved in could have been a preplanned scam.
You Were Waved Through A Turn
This con is referred to as a left turn driver down, and the scenario entails the following: you are waiting to make a left turn, another driver ahead of you on the opposite side has waved you through to go first. You take this offer and maneuver accordingly, however, the driver then pulls out in front of you and blocks the path, causing an accident. Or, the driver who waved you through stayed where they were, but another car pulled out from behind them and crashed into you as you made your left turn.
Sudden Brake Slamming
This type of car accident scam may involve one or more drivers. To make the incident appear more real, two drivers may work together. Imagine one driver is ahead of you, but then another gets in front of them and slams the brakes. The car that is now in between you slams on their brakes in response to the car ahead, causing you to not have enough time to respond. After you rear end the driver before you, the car furthest ahead will drive off. Similarly, a third car may pull up on your left or right side when the driver in front of you brakes suddenly, giving you no opportunity to swerve to avoid collision.
There Are False Eyewitnesses
Are there witnesses that claim to have seen the crash happen, but you don’t recognize them from the scene, or their story doesn’t make sense? Another sign that your car accident could be a scam attempt is if eyewitnesses who you have never seen before and were not involved in the incident suddenly are a part of the accident claim as witnesses. A good car accident lawyer can scrutinize these individuals to reveal if they are authentic, or not.
You may be asking yourself, what is the benefit for the scammer to cause an accident with you? What the scammer may then do is file a car accident claim pretending to have certain injuries that are fake, so they can make money from the incident. If you are now questioning what the other driver’s intentions really were, consider meeting with a legal team, similar to Norris Injury Law, as soon as possible so they can investigate. Don’t let yourself fall victim to a scam artist’s plan to take advantage of you and your insurance company.
