Expert: Ron Cercone - 2/3/2012

Question
Today my friend Stephen and I were in the parking lot of a supermarket. He usually backs into the spot but today he pulled into the spot, but two seconds later he realized he was pressed for time so he started to back out slowly. Another car backed out behind him at the same time.  

The two women got out of the car. The mother (not driving) started in about the bumper having black soot on it. I said "Dont worry about it, there is nothing there, nothing happened, lets just go our separate ways". So I thought they were going to listen to me because they both got back into their car and started to pull away.

So my friend Stephen started to pull away as well. As my friend Stephen was about to leave the young girl stopped and came over to Stephen and asked for his phone number because it was her fathers car. He said "No" and we drove away.

There was absolutely nothing on her car except black soot. Stephen never really even touched the car.

I told Stephen he was smart not to give his phone number to her because her father would trump up some problem where he would wind up paying for.

They saw soot on the back of their bumper, yet our cars backed out and never touched, so how is this possible that Stephens car damaged hers if our cars never touched? How would it be possible that our cars gently wound up next to each other if our bumpers were supposed to be neck and neck. This would be impossible because if our bumpers were neck and neck and we backed out further like we did to wind up next to one another we would have damaged our cars really bad.

Also Stephen pulled away as soon as she started to pull away. He only stopped when she stopped and then came over.

Answer
You can either turn it in to your insurance and let them argue in your behalf, or let them sue you in small claims court and see if a judge buys their story. If they did not take any pictures showing damage on that day, or had no witnesses, then its their word against yours, and the burden of proof is on the plaintiff, the person suing you.