Home Damaged in Hit and Run
A hit and run driver has left a Woodbury Heights home highly damaged. At approximately 1:30 or 2:00 p.m. on Saturday, June 27th, a driver ran off the road in the 200 block of Central Avenue in the Gloucester County town. The car backed over a curb, nearly hit a pickup truck, went over the home’s lawn, and smashed into the bedroom of the Daniels family’s 11-year-old daughter Shianne. The Daniels family, who lives in the home, was away at the Jersey Shore for the weekend, and possibly for that reason, no one was hurt in the crash. After hitting the house, the car drove off, heading toward Alliance Avenue. Neighbors called the Daniels family to come home after the wreck, alerting them to the damage to Shianne’s room. Doug Daniels, who lives in the home and is an officer with the Gloucester County Sheriff’s Department, described the process of sifting through the rubble in Shianne’s room, alongside local Woodbury Heights police, to find car parts left behind in the accident. The men found part of a shattered lens and rear driver-side light, and determined that the parts came from a Ford Windstar, built between 1999 and 2003. The Daniels family has turned to local media to ask the community to be on the lookout for such a vehicle with a possible missing tail light and damage to the rear driver’s side.
New Jersey law requires anyone who is in an accident causing either property damage or injury to another driver to stop and leave certain information with the other driver or person whose property was damaged, including their name, address, driver’s license number, and vehicle registration number. If the driver can’t locate the property owner when the damaged property is unattended, and the damaged property is something other than a vehicle, then they must drive to the nearest police station and report the accident. Leaving the scene of an accident where the driver knows or should know that they caused property damage can result in jail time, a suspended license, and up to $400 in fines. This amount is small in comparison to a possible civil judgment against a driver who causes a great deal of damage. If the hit-and-run driver is located (and, as this story shows, police and investigators have ways of determining which car was involved in a hit and run), then victims can sue for any expenses not covered by insurance, as well as possible punitive damages. Punitive damages may be available for the victim of willful, wanton, or reckless behavior, such as deliberately leaving the scene of an accident knowing it caused damage. The court punishes that deliberately harmful behavior by imposing additional economic penalties on the wrongdoer, in the form of punitive damages.
If you’ve been hurt or had property damaged by a hit and run crash, don’t assume that the driver will never be found. Contact an attorney as soon as possible to begin investigating the crash to determine who caused the damage, and to help you file any necessary police reports or claims with your insurance provider. For a free consultation on your claim from anywhere in the Wayne, New Jersey area, including Hawthorne, Patterson, Fairfield, Caldwell, Clifton, and throughout Hudson County, contact the personal injury attorneys at Massood Law Group, LLC. Call today for an evaluation of your possible hit and run lawsuit at 1-844-4MB-HURT or 973-696-1900.
