Good to hear Steve,
I haven't been on in a couple days. Tuesday night I got a phone call no parent ever wants to receive. "Dad I rolled my truck" Yep that's right, my 17 year old son flipped his truck at least once probably twice trying to avoid a deer up on the Blue Ridge Parkway , Federal Jurisdiction. I flew up the mountain and got to the scene. He haf four other kids in his truck and one girl was hurt, so the other car that was with them took her down the mountain to the hospital. All in all 3 kids were checked out at the hospital and all went home early Wed morning. However one girl had to be taken back to Baptist hospital last night for another CT because they are worried about internal bleeding. All in all it was incredible nobody was killed. Here is the killer!!!!!
A week before this is was up four wheeling in Low Gap and got his truck stuck in a river. A local farmer brought his tractor down and pulled him out but not before water had flooded the floor boards. This was right after I got out of the hospital, so he never told me, he and his buddies pulled the seats and carpet out of the truck to dry it out and then put back in the drivers seat so he could get to work. I told him, when I found out, 'Don't even think about driving with any passengers until those seats are put back in. His reply " Dad, I'm not that stupid!!! Tuesday he said his buddies were coming over to put everything back together and then they were going swimming. I wasn't feeling good so I was in bed early, I told him to be home by midnight. About 11:20 I got the phone call. At first I was going to try and get my dually close to it and use strap/chains whatever I had to turn the truck over and then come daylight I would get my buddies roll back and tow it home. But I was scared with injuries and a totaled truck the cops and insurance are going to require a report and wonder why I didn't call the cops. So I called and it took 1 hour and 45 min for a Federal Park Ranger to pull up on the scene. Can you imagine the look on my face when he climbs down to the truck with a flashlight and camera and comes back up the hill and asks me why my son was driving a truck with no seats in it!!!! I went ballistic, I was so pissed, then he tells me he found pot in the truck. Now I totally went nuts. My boy isn't perfect but he is a good kid and will always tell me the truth when I tell him to. I talked to him and each person in the truck and I told them to tell me the truth because this cop was going to give them all blood tests and it's going to come out anyway!!! Every kid said NO, TJ said Dad there is no way he could have found anything like that but he did admit to taking a pack of my Backwood smokes and the kids passed a couple around. So I asked the cop to show me the pot. He says " well it was small greenery, and not very much and I found a partial cigar so he assumed they had made a blunt!!! I told him my son admited to taking a pack of my cigars and they smoked some of them. The truck is sitting in 3-4 ft vegetation, I told the cop I wanted to see this "residue" he was talking about and he refused. I think he saw their bloodshot eyes and put his own story together. He took each kid aside and threatened to throw each of them in jail if they didn't tell the truth. I stood right their and every kid told the same exact story. The cop asked my son if he had ever tried pot, and my heart stopped when he said one time last week when a kid I don't like showed up and lit a joint and TJ said he took two puffs and gagged and choked and he hated it. So now if the cop forces a bloodtest it's going to show positive. I know I sound like a parent who believes his son is perfect, but that isn't true, I am really upset that he would even try it, because he always promissed me he would never drink or do drugs. Some of you have met my son, he is very into physical fitness and he wants to be a DEA agent, FBI, or SWAT, I told the cop this and he seemed to lighten up a bit. I was shocked when the cop admited to smoking a litlle grass when he was young. After the wrecker came and ripped the truck off the embankment we all went to the hospital where he questioned the other two girls who were being treated. They told the cop they saw TJ pull out some cigars and they tried them to but they didn't know if their was pot in them. The parent insisted on a blood test and they both came back negative, which backs up the story TJ and the other boys gave. The cop told me if he orders a blood test on TJ it will come back positive because it won't tell the difference between 3 hours ago and one week, and he didn't want to do that. Now I am shocked, at the scene he was so sure everyone was hight, and now he is changing his tune? I thought for sure someone would blood test TJ at least.
So as soon as the sun came up I was back on the scene taking photos of the skid marks and where it rolled, something the cop never did. I then decide to go by and see the truck at the wreckers yard, guess who is there? Officer Miller, I start looking through the truck, I find small greenery all over the bottom of the truck, I know what pot looks like!!! This ain't pot, it is clearly vegitation from the scene, I even cut some of the plants from the scene and had the samples in a baggie in my back pocket. I asked the officer " Is this what you are calling pot? " He nervously says "No, I don't actually see what I saw last night, it must have blown out during the tow" I wanted to laugh at him, he says "here is part of the cigar I found" I said yeah the kids have admited to smoking some of my cigars. He then opens the glove box and pulls everything out and says "look way down in the crease of the bottom there are seeds down there" Without admiting to a criminal past I am well aware of what pot seeds look like and I told the cop in the nicest way I could he had to be joking. I told him I will rip the gloe box out right there and I want him to send those seeds in for testing. He then says "Let me be honest with you, I am going to turn in what I have to the prosecutors office and they will decide what charges are filed, but I am positive they won't persue any drug charges, it just isn't worth their time with no evidence to back anything up, more than likely I will site your son for inproper equipment and that maybe all" Now we are getting to the bottom of things. But he said they could surprise him and call all five kids in before a federal magistrate and he would certainly get the truth out" Now I am back to square one, so I don't know what is going to happen.
I went and took the photos to our insurance agent. I didn't say anything about the seats not being in there, they will find that out soon enough when the adjuster sees the truck and the police report. TJ just received a $120 a month discount for going his first year and a half with a clean record. She said worse case scenario and he is charged the full 3 points, and using the same exact truck as a comparison she said his insurance will go up $43 per month. I couldn't believe that was all, she said if he stays clean he will receive more discounts every June and the accident would be off his record in 3 years. TJ's truck was in his own name, his own insurance policy, Thank God for that!!! TJ pays his own bills, gas, insurance, clothes, cel phone etc... not to many 17 year olds that can say that. Everyone I have talked to says that State Farm can't refuse to pay the claim because of the seats, but they can refuse to reinsure him or make his rates even higher, but they doubt that would happen. I don't know I reckon time will tell. I was also told that insurance only pay Nada retail, my neighbor owns the best body shop in town, and he is sure it is totaled but he is going to handle everything for us. I looked up Nada retail and was shocked when it came out at $10,500- $10,800, we paid $10,500 OTD about 6 months ago when we bought it. But he won't be driving for at least a couple more months, and I will now know exactly where he is going and with who. He understands he has lost my trust and has to earn it again. Thank God these girls weren't hurt worse, they could have been killed. Y'all help me pray this whole thing works out, he deserves to be punished don't get me wrong. I am just praying this is a life changing expierence. We have all had them, and we better ourselves from them. I feel bad as I can't wait for him to be 18, but then I think back at everything I was into at his age and he looks like an angel to me. If any of y'all have any advice I would appreciate it. I will try and post some pics. I am sorry about the novel, but I think it helped me to write it all down. Now I understand why some animals eat their young.
Thanks Y'all.
NCH
07-02-2009, 07:59 AM
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