Should I go after this guy who scammed $1000 from my aunt?

[Winston]

Last year, my aunt backed up into another car at the gas station. She said it was not even a collision, but more like a "kiss of the bumpers". She said that the damage to the car looked like a line or scratch on the paint, barely nothing. My dad was there and told me that there was a crack in the plastic near the bumper of the guy's car, but I'm not sure what that means. But my aunt denies that there was any crack at all though. She said she only saw a line or scratch.

But she did not want to use her insurance company to deal with this because it would increase her rates. So she preferred to settle it privately.

The guy called his mechanic to come over, and when he did, he quoted 1000 dollars to repair the damages. So that's what they demanded.

My aunt called my parents to come by and offer advice. My dad told my aunt that she ought to yield and give in, because the guy was dark skinned and had tattoos on his arm and looked like a gangster and could be violent. (My dad has an old school Taiwan mentality which believes that only criminals have tattoos, because that was true of the Taiwan of the past where he grew up.)

Being Taiwanese, my dad's mentality was that it is always better to yield than to fight because conflict is dangerous and life threatening, and because it's better to preserve the peace too. That is the traditional Taiwanese mentality. It's kind of weird and paranoid though. Even Rock, being Taiwanese inside, has the same view, that conflict is dangerous, so one should always yield to adversaries (at least face to face) rather than risk harm, even if he's in the right.

I think Rock is wrong about that though. I've been in many conflicts and disputes, and have never been harmed from them, but in fact, have won most of them. Obviously, Taiwanese do not have a warrior spirit and Taiwan is not a warrior culture, since it teaches submitting and yielding in times of conflict, even if you're right, in order to avoid risk and danger. That's why Taiwan has never won any wars or battles, nor has it ever conquered any nation. It has no great military victories to boast of. It is a culture of yielding to others.

Anyhow, it pisses me off that my dad will always yield, even to scammers, rather than standing up for right or justice. That's a major difference between me and him. Plus in the old days of Taiwan, only criminals and gangsters had tattoos, so my dad got his ideas about tattoos from back then. He doesn't understand that tattoos are mainstream now in the US, even among non-criminals.

Anyway, my dad was paranoid of the guy, who was pissed off and spoke loudly, so he urged her to yield and felt that the mechanic was only overcharging by a little. So my aunt ended up giving him $1000 even though she claimed she saw no visible damage other than a line or scratch.

But now my aunt regrets it. She feels she was scammed and pressured into handing over $1000 unnecessarily, and is pissed off about it. But since it's done, she has little recourse.

Also, her lawyer son in Vegas refuses to do anything to help her. I emailed him long ago when this situation occurred but he ignored me. He's not friendly or social at all. He's a dead beat son who doesn't care about his mother and won't help her in any way. He won't even give her a ride to the airport. I don't know why. Maybe lawyers are just assholes and sociopaths who don't care about their own family? This cousin is an example of why you should not raise your kids in the US, lest they grow up and become assholes and not care about you or others. He has a profile on a lawyer review site here: http://www.avvo.com/attorneys/89110-nv- ... 70914.html

Wow. Not surprisingly, most of his reviews from clients are very bad and highly negative:
http://www.avvo.com/attorneys/89110-nv- ... views.html
http://www.lawyerratingz.com/ratings/10 ... Huang.html

Anyway, should I get involved and do my thing? I Googled the guy's name, and it's uncommon. There are only a few links about him on Google, from his Facebook and LinkedIn page. So it would be an easy piece of cake for me to put up webpages about him that would get to the top of Google. I could contact him about it and threaten to contact his boss too, since his employer is listed in his links. I could easily damage the guy's professional reputation this way.

The thing is, the guy is an IT manager at a bank, which is a professional position. So he is not the gangster that my dad thought he was. But it's also odd, because IT professionals with good salaries do not usually scam old women out of $1000. Or would they? Plus he does not look like an IT professional either. See his photos below.

What do you think? Should I use my bag of dirty tricks to damage his reputation and demand that he right the wrong?

This is what the guy looks like. I wonder what ethnicity he is.

[Jester]

You've posted here, that's plenty.

Leave it. Money was handed over. Done.

Time to argue is before.

[Winston]

You've posted here, that's plenty.

Leave it. Money was handed over. Done.

Time to argue is before.

Why? I did not post his name here yet. An injustice is an injustice. Just because it's in the past doesn't mean it should be forgotten. Why not try to correct it? A thousand dollars is a lot. Why not teach him a lesson or show him the consequences?

[Rock]

You've posted here, that's plenty.

Leave it. Money was handed over. Done.

Time to argue is before.

Why? I did not post his name here yet. An injustice is an injustice. Just because it's in the past doesn't mean it should be forgotten. Why not try to correct it? A thousand dollars is a lot. Why not teach him a lesson or show him the consequences?

Your aunt should have called over her own mechanic if she had any doubts. But she didn't! She handed over the cash. Case closed. Your aunt is of age and of sound mind. She was under no duress. It was a public place and unless the guy was threatening her physically, she made a decided to pay him off instead of involving her insurance company. Case closed.

Funny that your dad saw more damage than your aunt. If the fiberglass was broken, perhaps the whole piece had to be replaced. Do you have any idea how much that would cost? Anyway, you're shooting from the hip her Winston. You don't have strong facts. Your dad contradicts your aunt, she doesn't know what the real charges should have been because she did not involve a mechanic from her side. And she was the one who hit the guy.

So now you're gonna go after him? You like to use me as an example of Taiwanese meekness. But hey, I don't get scammed and cheated like that. I would have called my own mechanic or randomly found one nearby to get a more objective opinion. I would not have just handed over $1,000. But if the guy insisted on calling cops over, having a police report done, and informing insurance company, he would have been in his right I think.

[Winston]

Rock,
Yeah my aunt screwed up. But the guy shouldn't charge $1000 for little or no damage. I'd like to see him try to justify that. Rock you keep forgetting something. In a situation under stress a person cannot think clearly. You aren't very understanding of human nature. Why are you so robotic? My aunt was under pressure by him and my dad. Two people are a strong influence. Everyone makes mistakes under pressure. You can't always judge as an armchair quarterback.

So what vibes do you get from his photos? Does he look like a bank manager? Why would a bank manager scam someone like that?

[Rock]

Rock,
Yeah my aunt screwed up. But the guy shouldn't charge $1000 for little or no damage. I'd like to see him try to justify that. Rock you keep forgetting something. In a situation under stress a person cannot think clearly. You aren't very understanding of human nature. Why are you so robotic? My aunt was under pressure by him and my dad. Two people are a strong influence. Everyone makes mistakes under pressure. You can't always judge as an armchair quarterback.

So what vibes do you get from his photos? Does he look like a bank manager? Why would a bank manager scam someone like that?

When similar things happen in my life, I act. I practice what I preach. That's why I don't have a history of being cheated, mugged, and taken in by cons like you do even though I've spent so much time in third world countries and have been exposed to a lot more danger than your pampered ass.

So just let it be. When you hand over cash like that, it's an implicit agreement, a done deal. If she regrets, so sorry. That's her bad. You gotta own up to your own mistakes. If you are weak, others will most likely take advantage of that.

[Luc Furr]

Winston,

A couple questions to ponder:

Who scammed who? Was, perhaps, the IT managers mechanic the one doing the scamming?

Did anybody really lose from the accident? Aunt didn't want insurance involved and got her way, person who didn't want conflict and got his way, IT manager wanted his car repaired and got his way. Doesn't that sound like nobody lost but instead everybody won?

[Winston]

Winston,

A couple questions to ponder:

Who scammed who? Was, perhaps, the IT managers mechanic the one doing the scamming?

Did anybody really lose from the accident? Aunt didn't want insurance involved and got her way, person who didn't want conflict and got his way, IT manager wanted his car repaired and got his way. Doesn't that sound like nobody lost but instead everybody won?

You forgot something. If there was no real damage to the car, then it was not necessary to pay a thousand dollars in damages. She said that the bumpers kissed, it was not a real hit or collision. If she is right, then he scammed her. Scammers deserve to be punished.

I would like to see photos of the damage. Even if the plastic was cracked, I don't think it would be that much to fix.

Repairs in America are exorbitantly priced. I can't believe people want to put up with America.

What if you had let the insurance company deal with it? Would they have paid the guy whatever he wanted, or would they have sent out their own inspector to assess the damage? How does that usually work?

[Winston]

Here is Momopi's assessment of this issue. According to his analysis, the likelihood is that the damage was NOT worth $1000. So the guy most likely overcharged.

The car bumper is part of the car's front or rear crumple zone, they're designed to absorb impact during collision by controlled deformation (directing energy away from occupants in the car). The bumper cover and the bumper itself are 2 different things. If you bump into someone's car, you might only see minor cosmetic damage on the bumper cover, but the bumper under it may have sustained far greater damage with cracked absorbers or bent reinforcement bars. Once the bumper itself is compromised, it will not offer the same level of protection as part of your crumple zone, and should be replaced for safety (though many people do not).

The actual replacement parts are relatively cheap, but mechanics will charge few hundred dollars more to cover labor and shop insurance/liability. To replace a bumper, you should expect $300 to $500 at the shop for average sedan. If additional body work and paint is required, then it'd cost more. If you do it at the dealer, they'd charge you $500-$700+. If the bumper cover was damaged, then that's another $100-$200 to replace + labor and paint.

Is it possible that the actual damage was indeed $1,000? Yes, possible, but likely LESS. The issue here is that your aunt (and your father) need to request your own mechanic to inspect the damage, so you can get a second opinion As far as we know, the other guy could have called his buddy and said "quote $1,000 and we'll split 50-50". If there was no damage to the bumper and it's only a scratch, then it should not have costed more than $200-$300 for scratch fill and paint. The bumper is in a location where you don't have to repaint the entire side of a car to match. If the scratch was on a side door then yeah, you cannot just repaint 1 door (it'd look really weird), you must repaint the entire side ($$$) to paint-match.

Also, having an accident will only increase your annual insurance payment by so much. In your aunt's case, even if the actual damage was $1,000, it may have been cheaper to have the insurance take care of it.

My $0.02 is that if you waned to contest the $1,000 bill, it should have been done immediately. If the accident occurred last year, it may still be possible to take the person to small claims court to ask $500 back, but it won't be easy.

[Luc Furr]

Winston,

did your Auntie look under the Kelly guys car at the reverse side of the bumper? Did she look to see if any of the bumper supports were bent or stressed rendering them worthless in a followup collision?

Unseen damage on those damn new bumpers is a gold mine for the auto repair business!

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/boxster- ... amage.html

http://www.fordflex.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=7322

All that said, no man can chose your path for you. As you will, good sir.

[Winston]

Winston,

did your Auntie look under the Kelly guys car at the reverse side of the bumper? Did she look to see if any of the bumper supports were bent or stressed rendering them worthless in a followup collision?

Unseen damage on those damn new bumpers is a gold mine for the auto repair business!

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/boxster- ... amage.html

http://www.fordflex.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=7322

All that said, no man can chose your path for you. As you will, good sir.

Man your reading comprehension is terrible. lol. Kelly is my aunt's lawyer son who refuses to do anything for her. Didn't you read?

Yes my aunt examined the bumper closely. I told you, she only lightly bumped it. Bumpers are not that fragile, or else the wind would damage them. I have lightly bumped bumpers before but there was no damage.

You did not read your own link carefully. The OP said:

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/boxster- ... amage.html

There is not a mark on my bumper. It was a good thunk though.

As you can see, his car got hit by another car and there was a loud thunk. In contrast, my aunt lightly bumped the other car while slowly backing up at a gas station, like two bumpers kissing. A light bump is not gonna cause damage to a new car. If it did, then the wind would damage it too.

Can you please read carefully next time before jumping to the wrong conclusion?

Auto shops are scammers and tend to overcharge for every little thing. There are easy ways of fixing things but they always prefer the most expensive way. I wonder how they sleep at night. I couldn't sleep at night if I overcharged.

[Luc Furr]

Interesting, that those idiotic errors occurred. I must be so stupid. LOL Reminds me of something Po, from Kung fu Panda, or Zed, from Year One, would do. LOL

[Winston]

Update:

I just send a message to the guy to his YouTube and Facebook accounts, which I found. I told him the situation and asked him to explain why he wanted $1000, and I sent him the link to this thread as well, to show him that he is being discussed. That should get his attention rather than a brush off. lol

Rock,
Come on now. I know you're a Curious George. You're probably curious to know how that guy will react when threatened with web pages tarnishing his name with scam alerts. lol

[Halwick]

This is what the guy looks like. I wonder what ethnicity he is.

Looks like a Filipino or Thai or Cambodian. Not surprised he would pull a scam like this.
Sorry to hear about your Aunt's unfortunate experience.
What goes around comes around.....he'll be scammed himself and lose twice what he scammed out of your Aunt.

[Winston]

Really? Are you sure he's not Mexican? I thought he was Hispanic.

So even Filipinos in the US scam people?

Maybe I can be an agent of karma then. lol