What can I expect the police officer to do at the scene of my Florida car accident?
Video Transcription:
We’ve seen recently two things occur. If you call 911, they sometimes ask if anyone is injured. Sometimes your adrenaline is rushing, you might not feel any injuries at the time, you say no. They say, “We are not sending anybody, exchange information, thanks for calling.” Two, a police officer does arrive on the scene but decides not to fill out a long form traffic crash report. Instead, they provide you with a driver’s exchange of information which includes contact information, insurance information, and that’s it. There is no report as to who did what during the accident.
At this point I would highly suggest either requesting the long form traffic crash report insisting it be done and if you can’t do that, document everything yourself. Photographs of the incident, photographs of skid marks, photographs of property damage. Take pictures yourself of the license plate. The driver, the vin number. If you can’t get the driver to admit if they were at fault via some short written document you can do yourself or you’ve got a smartphone, record them with their permission. Because often times if you don’t have this documentation it becomes a he said, she said and it’s very difficult to prove without any other evidence besides your word.