I mentioned it only briefly on this site, because I was ill at the time and that took more of my attention, but last year I witnessed an apparently-drunk driver hit a parked car. I reported it to the police at the time, and gave a statement and all that, and figured I’d never have to care about it again. But then, just a month or two ago, I got a subpoena telling me to appear in court. I was surprised to learn that it is apparently common for things to take this long, or longer. I don’t know what I was expected to contribute to the proceedings. If I was expected to pick out the guy in court, I was not confident I would be able to remember what a guy I saw for about four minutes over a year ago looks like (I was, in fact, very confident I would not be able to). But I had planned on going, because that’s what the paper told me to do. And since court is done in the daytime (not like on television), that meant I’d have to be awake in the daytime. It’s terrible.

I booked two nights off work and began adjusting my sleep schedule to minimize how much I’d hate the world. But then, yesterday, the day before I was supposed to go to court, I got a phone message telling me the driver had plead guilty and now I wasn’t needed. I wish I’d been told that week earlier, eh?

Anyway, in the buildup to this, I noticed that, on the night I witnessed the event, I wrote a note in a text file on my desktop and still had it. Even though it’s been a year since I gave the info to the police, I’d hate to delete this, so why not stick it on my website?

It was about 4:50 and I was heading downhill at around 5300 South St. There was a vehicle (a big vehicle, some kind of jeep or suv or something. It was a dark color, perhaps black or dark blue or something, it is hard to tell at night) about three car lengths ahead of me, which had pulled onto the street making a left turn from Queen St. just as I was finishing my delivery nearby. This vehicle was about three car lengths ahead of me, moving the same direction, until it hit a car parked at the right side of the road. The vehicle continued moving forward after the hit, for some distance, but I don’t know if it was trying to continue driving or just if it was rolling after the driver had lost control. When the vehicle stopped, I stopped as well. I approached just as the driver was getting out and going around to the passenger’s side to see the damage to his car. The front wheel on that side was badly damaged and seemed to be nearly coming off.
I asked if he was okay, he said he was. I asked if he had a phone, but he did not answer that, just continued looking at the damage. I did not see any other passenger in his vehicle and he seemed fine. With the damage to his vehicle, I did not think he would be a risk for a Hit and Run, because he would not be capable of the run part. Still, I wrote down his license plate just in case (F** **7). Since I was still working, and since it didn’t seem like I could do anything there, I left to finish my next delivery.
The driver of the vehicle was either a white male, or a very light-skinned brown. He had dark hair, probably brown or black, and (I think) glasses and facial hair. He was wearing light clothes.

And now that that is immortalized on my site, I can get it off my computer. Anyway, as I write this, five hours from when I was due to be at court, I note that I actually have some disappointment that I can’t go. I felt that way too the time I got out of jury duty, but this would actually have been easier even than that. While jury duty would have disrupted my life for a week or more, this was a day or so tops, I assume. It would have been neat to see how things work. Ah well.