Need advice

[hgulensoy]

During May 2003 I have rented a car. I had an accident. Since I didn’t take any insurance, the rental car company wants me to pay the amount of $10,000. At the moment I am unemployed and I don’t have money (or any real property, a car etc) to pay the amount. I will try to write the facts to you:

1. I am not a U.S. citizen or a permanent resident I was here as a student.
2. I have rented the car with my country's driving license and paid with a credit card from my country. (I also lost the credit card during the accident so the card was cancelled)
3. The rental car company has my old address (in the US), my cancelled credit card number, and my old telephone number.
4. I will have to leave the country since I couldn’t find a job here.

I wonder what the consequences can be if I leave the country without paying it? And should I call them and tell them that I won’t be able to pay the amount since I don’t have money and leaving the country? (What I am wondering is if they will come after me in my country? The rental car company has offices in my country.)

[Ididnotdoit]

Well, hopefully they will come after you.  After all, you decided not to take the insurance, and then you crashed their car.  Now, sisce you were stupid enough not to take the insurance, you want to get out of it.

Tell you what.  Don't come to my country, cause damages to the people of my country, and then ask me, a citizen of this country, if you can weasle out of it, ok?

Perhaps you should never have been granted the privilege of comming to this country to get educated in the first place.

[melissa2781]

you go Ididnotdoit!!        

[zevkirsh]

Please Ididnotdoit,

Let's not resort to xenophobic hateful ranting. Still, Mr. Lensoy should try to come up with some negotiation to pay back the 10,000, or part of it, no matter how long it takes.
running away from an obligation is wrong, and bad, and wrongbad( this denotes a unique combination of wrongness and badness, It's even worse than wrong and bad combined seperately. Synergy baby!)

good luck

[sagemenscircle]

If you attempt to evade responsibility for this:
a) expect a bench warrant to be issued. If you go home and never return there is basically nothing that can be done to you.
b) If you come back you are screwed big time. Did you want to come back. If so, grow up, take your medicine and learn to live up to your obligations. If not, go home, do the same thing anyway, and take it as a cheap lesson that helped build character.
PS. I agree with the xenophobia remark, my advice would be the same to you if you were a citizen. In fact, it would probably be double.
I agree stronly with zevkirsch, unless you plan to go home and stay there. In that case, the $10,000 would simply be too much of a burden. Live and learn my friend.

[antiparasite]

 You should consider Your options here.
 First of all, it is wrong on a personal basis AND on a legal basis to run away from your responsibilities, but since you are asking this in a forum for future lawyers (who are supposed to represent a client outside of their moral bias anyways). I think this seems to be lost among some of my prospective honorable colleagues here, but again, since you are raisng this issue in a forum for lawyers-to be, it deserves some answer free from any moral judgement. You have suffered enough in this tragedy and I don't think you should let yourself be further put down by someone that seem more akin to pass out judgements than offer help. I think it is genuine of anyone with legal knowledge to share advice and thoughts about your options..

 
  Your options are very simple, but MIGHT become trickier if you are not sure about your future intentions with the United States:


        A. If you do not intend to ever return to the US and can live with this thing personally, I would advice you to go home, wherever that is and NEVER come back again. Although even SUCH things have statute of limitations, I wouldn't rely upon it.  So again, if you DO decide to leave and not pay for it, then do not count on returning either.

 It is possible, but not very likely that the company can go after you in your own country, regardless, although I wouldn't go to them and rent any cars..

       B. If you DO intend to stay or return later on (remember FOREVER is a long time), then I would advice you to get some assistance and try to work out your differences concerning the payment. Again, if you are genuine and act straightforward about this, most companies will cut you some slakc and be willing to work with you. If you cannot pay them, there is not much you can do anyways.

 Again, 10K is not the worst crisis in life and with decent payment options here, you should be able to deal with it in due time. Personally, I would have tried working out something with them, but if you choose not to, that is your choice and you have the right to make Your own decicions in life..

      Good luck to You in whatever endeavour you choose to implement.

[wiseguy]

Well it seems ur problem is u don't have money to pay for it, or u would, and u don't have money cuz u don't have a job. There's a McDonald's hiring a block away from where i live, they will pay u $5.25 an hour, not a bad wage; i can give u the phone number if u want, so problem solved!!!

[goofball]

Since you are not a citizen or a LPR (legal permanent resident) you don't have the option/luxury of declaring bankruptcy.

I suggest you try to set up a payment plan...even if it is as low as $100/month.  They'll be glad to get anything out of you.

If you ever plan on living in the US again, you should settle this somewhow.

[blag]

antiparasite, hgulensoy is not a client of anyone on this website. Further, no one responding on this thread is an attorney - they are law students. As such there is no professional obligation toward hgulensoy. We can morally judge away all we like and remain free of any professional ethical conflict. You don't seem to have a grasp of what's going on antiparasite.

hgulensoy, what was the nature of the accident? What did the police report say? Were you ruled to be at fault? Did you hit somebody else or did somebody else hit you? If the former, i've got no pity for your situation and hope they squeeze the money out of you.

If I were in another country and I caused damages there, i've got to be honest - i may be tempted to skip home and never go back. But at least in so doing I'd know I was wrong and wouldn't dream of having the gall to ask the people of that country "Hey, is it cool if I skip out of your country without paying?". That's just common courtesy.

[antiparasite]

antiparasite, hgulensoy is not a client of anyone on this website. Further, no one responding on this thread is an attorney - they are law students. As such there is no professional obligation toward hgulensoy. We can morally judge away all we like and remain free of any professional ethical conflict. You don't seem to have a grasp of what's going on antiparasite.

 Where do you think you are??

     Have you hard about dressing for the job you want rather than the one you have??

     This individual wanted some sound advice and was obviously in distress about this. Prospective lawyers should LEARN early on to apply professional non-judgemental counselling to a perosn asking for advice, especially when it costs then nothing whatsoever. Being from a proessional career myself, I know how important it is to stand up and act within moral integrity and courtesy towards people in need of help at ANY times. Maybe this is one of the main problems of to many people that seek law school. They think all moral and ethical considerations can be dumbed in the garbage bin as long as there is no $$$ on the table..
  Your immature self-justification of senseless vindiction wouldn't hold long if anyone was evaluating you as a prosepctive employee.

             IF you don't intend to help a person, then shut up and stay out of it. If you prefer to bash people and pass out moral judgements then maybe you should limit yourself to being a legal secretary/paralegal if you still want to smell the legal air without the ethical burden.

                -J-