Originally Posted by
FBinNY
There are two separate issues here. Civil liability and criminal liability.
Civil law varies among the states, but in New York, good evidence that the car was involved would make the owner and his insurance liable. Reporting a theft 8 days after the fact wouldn't change this, so the victim could recover damages from the car owner, regardless of who was driving.
OTOH, a criminal action for leaving the scene or any other related crime requires putting a particular driver behind the wheel. If the owner has clear proof that he was out of town it leaves him out, and puts the spotlight on his roommates. OTOH, being one of a pool of suspects, even if it's proven that it had to be one of them isn't enough to charge, much less convict. Without evidence putting a specific person behind the wheel at the time, there's no criminal case.
Some people may not like this, and I suggest they move to France where under the Napoleonic code the driver and his roommates could be charged, and the burden of proving they didn't do it would fall on them. As for me, I'm happy with innocent until proven guilty even if it means that some of the worst scum gets away with stuff like this.
Rather than go back in time and deal with all that, we can just stay put as we enter into a total surveillance state. Soon enough, there will be enough private and public cameras on the road to always establish who was driving when and where. Add in the tracking of the phones and all financial transactions and it's getting mighty close.
I mildly support this as a remedy for motorists being able to evade responsibility for their actions. It's a steep price, but we have brought it on ourselves by not requiring the cars to keep data on who is driving and where, which could be subject to reasonable searches only under a warrant.