Ok guys, here's the final update so everyone can have their damn closure
After finding the truck sitting in the parking garage, I was freaked out. I didn't really think my suspicion was going to pan out, but the evidence was sitting right in front of me.
My friend couldn't believe it either. There were so many things I wanted to do to his truck at that moment - I wanted to bash in every window with my fist. I wanted to pour brake fluid over the entire car. I wanted to loosen all of his lugnuts - I was laughing over the hilarious mental image of him driving off and all 4 of his wheels falling off simultaneously.
But I knew I couldn't do any of that. It had been a very long night and I knew anything I did now would just complicate things down the line, so I went home and rolled around in bed while I tried to fall asleep; my mind was still racing a million miles a minute.
The next morning when I woke up, I was greeted by a few PMs on the forums. Some mystery man that worked for a repossession company had taken the liberty of running the guys license plates. He sent me all of his personal information, including his home address back in Houston and all of his phone numbers.
I decided to lay low and start building evidence against him. I didn't try to contact him or my ex-friend down the hall - I acted completely stupid and hopeless like I had no clue about anything. My ******* ex-friend down the hall was very persistent in asking me what was going on with the police investigation. I acted very disheartened and disappointed and told him they wern't really doing anything to help and that I still had no idea who it might have been.
Every night for the next week, I went to his parking garage to start gathering evidence. On the fourth night, I struck pure gold - for some reason, he decided to put the trailer hitch back on. I guess because the police hadn't contacted him yet and because I kept acting dumb to his middle man (ex-friend down the hall) he assumed he was in the clear. Haha, big ****ing mistake!
Boy, that pattern sure looks familiar...
Excited as hell, I continued to play stupid and disheartened to my ex-friend whenever he would try to squeeze information out of me. After compiling a bunch of the evidence (photographs, sequence of events, etc.) I called the officer handling my case and requested a meeting with him. We sat down together the next day and I presented him with all of the information I had collected over the past week. He was very impressed with the amount of detective work I had done and assured me he would follow up on everything.
Well after not hearing anything for the next two weeks, I called the officer handling my case again. He told me that he had tried calling the guy with the truck at least 4 times, and he showed up 3 times at his apartment with no answer (big surprise). He said that because he couldn't get in touch with the suspect for questioning, the case was now 'inactive' since nothing further could be done.
I was ****ing furious, and he definitely knew it. I told him that was ****ing ridiculous and that I wanted to see the Sergeant immediately. He hesitantly walked to the back office and retrieved an old, fat, sarcastic shell of a man in a blue uniform. I introduced myself and briefly explained my case and the situation, and he just kept saying 'uh-huh' and gave me this sarcastic '**** off' look the whole time I was talking. I wanted to punch him in the ****ing face because he was making absolutely no effort to even pretend to be interested in what I was saying - the only thing he was interested in protecting and serving was the **** in his ass. The police 'investigation' was officially made 'inactive' because they couldn't reach the suspect for questioning (even though I provided them with his parents address back in Houston) and I realized I wasn't going to get anywhere - especially with this Sergeant overseeing everything.
Now don't get me wrong, I'm not a cop-hater by any means. I have a lot of respect for the police and the fact that they put their lives in danger every day to protect other citizens, but at this point I was ****ing infuriated. "So because this kid decides to avoid you by not picking up his phone or answer the door, you can't do anything more and I get ****ed, is that basically what you're saying?". I grabbed all of my pictures, slammed my folder shut and kicked the chair back under the table and stormed out. "Have a nice day" the Sergeant said as I turned to leave. "**** off" I said with my back turned as I proceeded to walk out of the station.
The next day I decided to give the kid's Dad a call with the home phone number that I had gotten with the rest of his personal information. "Hello?" the voice on the other end of the line said. "Hello, may I ask who I'm speaking with?..."
"Hello." I replied. "Is this the father of Robby Blake?" I asked. The voice on the other end of the line suddenly got very quiet.
"Yes I am his father, may I ask who's calling?". I proceeded to introduce myself and explained that my car had recently become victim to a pretty serious case of vandalism. For the next 20 minutes, I explained that his son had done a considerable amount of damage to my car. I provided him with some basic information about the situation, but I didn't want to give away any of the critical secret evidence that I had been gathering.
He seemed rather confused and I don't think he was taking me completely serious yet. "Your son is facing a handful of state-jail felonies because of his actions, and I'm dead serious about that." I continued to explain how the police had been trying to get in touch with his son over the past week and that they were very serious about prosecuting him with the evidence I had gathered.
"Before I decide to pursue any further action with the police, how would you like to have a meeting to discuss all of this?" I proposed. He quickly agreed and we settled on a place in town for the following Saturday.
Saturday finally rolls around and I walk in the door of our agreed meeting place with my folder of evidence gripped firmly in my left hand. I spot his dad sitting down at a table by himself - great. I walk up to the table, extend my hand to greet his father, and purposely let the folder of pictures fall open on the table in front of him. "Oops," I said, "you wern't supposed to see that yet.."
I closed the folder and sat down across from him. After exchanging a few civilities, I started getting right down to business. I started going through the events of the entire night of the hit-and-run with him, providing him with pictures as I talked. "You'll probably want to see this before I go any further" and I handed him a complete copy of the police report.
The police officer handling my case had mistakenly wrote in all of the suspects personal information under 'Vehicle #2' in the accident report. When the police report was filled out, Vehicle #2 simply was the unknown car with unknown driver that hit my car. However after I provided him with pictures of the kids truck, his license plate number, and all of his personal contact information - he updated the report and mistakenly filled out all of that information under the 'Vehicle #2' section of the police report - making it look like the police KNEW he was the one that damaged my car.
"As you can see from this official copy of the police report, your son was undoubtedly the one who vandalized my vehicle." I continued to feed him pictures of his trailer hitch and the damage to my rear bumper - an exact match. I continued explaining my current plan of action - filing a civil lawsuit and pursuing criminal charges with the police investigation (which I conveniently failed to mention was now 'inactive'...).
My eyes widened as he reached into his back pocket. "Look," he said, "this was obviously a very bad decision on my son's part, and looking at this police report he was obviously the one at fault - I'll do whatever it takes to fix this situation so we can forget about it and move on with our respective lives."
He pulled out a checkbook and carefully laid it on the desk in front of him. "Well lets start by taking a look at these.." I said, sliding over the itemized repair bill from Dallas' most expensive bodyshop. "$3500 is what it cost me out of pocket to repair my car to satisfaction after your son vandalized my car."
20 minutes later, I shook his hand stood up. I walked out of the door with a check for $5000 in my wallet. "Haha, sucker.." I said under my breath as I walked slowly towards my once-again beautiful FD sitting by itself in the parking lot, admiring the brand new authentic OEM '99-spec front bumper and turn lamps that his dad just paid for.
"Too bad insurance already paid for the entire repair, *******.." were the last words to escape my mouth before all the noise in the cabin was drowned out by the sound of my turbochargers spooling up.
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