Hit and Run Accidents Down in 2014

An unidentified man recently hit a woman with his car and Bell St., and, betraying her trust that he would call for help, footed it to his vehicle and sped away.

Another driver, seated behind the wheel of a truck pulling a trailer, switched lanes in front of an SUV in June, nipped the front end of a vehicle, then hit the accelerator when the woman approached with her hand on the truck and dragged her roughly 100 yards. She suffered severe injuries and had to be transported to Dallas.

A 27-year-old man was hit by a truck outside Midnight Rodeo in January that sped away from the scene, leaving the victim with severe leg injuries. Police sought the public’s assistance in locating the driver, however the suspect was never found.

San Angelo sees an average of 12-15 hit and run accidents involving pedestrians each year, Hit and Run Investigator Steven Quade said. So far this year several have been reported and only few of the suspects were ever located.

Due to the circumstances surrounding most hit and runs—focus on victims, accidents occurring in parking lots when no one’s around, and other like ilk—a large portion of the crimes go unsolved.

San Angelo, however, has a fairly high clearance rate at 43 percent so far this year, up from 40 percent last year. 

"The easiest part is actually finding the car," Quade said. "This is a two-part deal: you've got to find the car and then you've got to find the driver. A lot of times we'll find the car and then have difficulty finding the person that was actually driving."

Quade said good vehicle descriptions with license plate numbers or partial plate numbers increase the likelihood of finding the suspect, and the public provides a lot of tips via Facebook or other means when the department is seeking information on a particular vehicle and driver.

"They'll tell you that they panicked or just didn't know what to do or something like that," Quade said of the suspects when they're caught. "But it's usually more than that. We'll find out that they have a suspended license, no insurance or they'll be drunk or something like that. A lot of them are drunk and leave the scene instead of getting a DWI."

Despite increasing headlines reporting that a driver has fled, Quade said that in 2014 the numbers for hit and runs are actually down over the year prior, and unless something changes, 2014 will actually fare better than 2013.

“In 2013 we averaged 71 hit and run accidents each month and in 2014 we are averaging 65,” Quade wrote in an email.  “With the totals for the year so far, we are going to be about 80 hit and run accidents fewer than in 2013.  As far as pedestrians we don’t have stats that just break down pedestrians, but we are seeing about 12 to 15 a year.”

So far this year, 582 hit and run accidents have been reported within city limits. At the end of 2013, that number was almost 300 more at 851. The vast majority of the accidents occur on the street, Quade indicated, and those numbers include incidents that occur curbside outside of residences.

Street hit and run accidents in 2013 included a hefty 496, while to date in 2014 only 359 have been reported. A total of 355 hit and runs on private property, such as parking lots, were reported in 2013, whereas 223 have been reported on private property so far this year. 

Victims involved in hit and runs are often left seeking answers, and many may find that despite their “full coverage” insurance, they’re still liable for the costs of the damage.

“There’s really no such thing as full coverage because there’s so many ways to customize a policy for each individual,” Cheyenne Barden of Cheyenne Barden Insurance said. “Traditionally speaking, when people say, ‘Oh, I have full coverage,’ that just means that they have the liability that the state requires and then they have some sort of comprehensive and collision coverage.”

Barden explained that liability insurance coverage is what the state mandates, and that liability policies are used to protect other people.  

“So, for example, if you had liability coverage only on your car, and you were the one who got hit by someone…then it’s not going to help you because what it’s for is if you hit someone else,” she said.

Knocked off side mirrors and parking lot fender benders are the most common type of hit and run accidents Barden sees at her agency, she said, and in order for a victim to be covered in a hit and run, they need to have an additional layer of insurance coverage.

The best policy is uninsured/underinsured coverage, she said, which protects drivers from accidents caused by others whose policies won’t cover the damage. The cost for uninsured/underinsured is minimal, she said, and is based upon the individual consumer.

“There’s so many people that get insurance just to go get their car inspected, then they drop it, they don’t bother keeping it up,” Barden said. “So you have to drive defensively and think in a defensive mindset, making sure that you’re protected just in case someone else didn’t bother keeping up with their legal obligations.”

Many drivers have comprehensive and collision coverage, she said, which is what most people think of when they hear the term “full coverage”. Under these policies, collisions include hitting other objects, be it stationary, moving or a pedestrian. Comprehensive coverage refers to “acts of God”, Barden explained, and covers accidents that are out of a driver’s control, such as hail storms and deer.

Barden said she has a team member who previously had no uninsured/underinsured coverage. When she was hit by a man without adequate coverage, she had to pay for it out of her collision coverage.

“So she had to pay the deductable to get her vehicle fixed and it went down as a hickey on her claims record,” Barden said. “It can be utilized that way, but if you do it that way, you’re the one who’s penalized on your claims history unless it’s subrogate later on down the road.”

Barden suggested that drivers check their policies and bring their declarations page to an insurance agent if they are not sure what their policies cover.

"We just need people to be more observant," Quade said. "If they see it, witness it or anything like that, stop, let people know what you saw. That's the hard thing is getting people to stop and get involved."