Your thoughts on this situation?

Parent Cafe
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<p>Alright, I had a disturbing incident happen to me yesterday and thought I would seek some input on how to deal with this situation.</p>

<p>Yesterday evening, I was driving back to school after a short trip home. The first part of my journey was on a four-lane highway, with a large grass median in the middle. The posted speed limit was 55, but I was pretty drowsy and anxious to get back to school before I fell asleep so I had my cruise control set on 80.</p>

<p>About 20 minutes into the trip I passed a young African-American male, early 20s, driving a black BMW 5 series that still had the dealer tags on it. I thought nothing of it at the time, and soon lost sight of the car. About 10 minutes later, I saw the car rapidly approaching me in the fast lane. I was doing about 80 at the time and he was closing on me very rapidly, so he had to be doing close to 100 MPH. Once again, I shrugged it off and figured he was just in a hurry and was going to pass me.</p>

<p>As his car drew closer to mine, he rapidly shifted lanes, braked, and started riding my bumper. This concerned me, so I slowed down and changed lanes several times. No matter what I did, this guy stayed about 3 feet from my bumper and mimicked every move I made. Eventually, I caught up to some other traffic and through some careful maneuvering forced him to pass me. Once he passed me, he slowed down and tried to mimic every move I made while he was in front of me. Concerned, I exited into a city. He mimicked my move, exited with me, and pulled in front of me at a stop light. </p>

<p>Once at the stoplight, this guy rolled down his window and made a gesture out the window that implied that he wanted money. The gesture is pretty familiar and is hard to explain, but I took it as the universal symbol that he was seeking to get some money from me. This creeped me out even further, so I executed an immediate U-turn and tried to lose the guy. I thought I had succeeded, but 10 minutes later I looked in my rearview mirror and he was on my tail again. I ended up pushing my car past 100 mph, making a quick exit, and eventually I lost the guy. I ended up driving an hour back home, and taking an alternate route back to school that added two hours to my travel time.</p>

<p>Has anyone had any experiences like this in the past? Did I do the right thing? Should I have called this guy into the police, or was I just overreacting?</p>

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<p>Why wouldn’t you have called the police? Obviously you were in danger.</p>

<p>The other thing I wonder about is why you mentioned the race of the person who was tailing you. The race wasn’t important. What was important was the person’s behavior, which was threatening to you.</p>

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<p>The guy’s race wasn’t really significant, and neither was the make, color, and model of his car. I just included it to be complete and accurate, not for any ulterior reason.</p>

<p>I thought about calling the police, but as the incident dragged on I began to get into fight-or-flight mode, and it was hard enough to keep my eyes on the road without looking behind me every few seconds. By the time it was over, I was completely exhausted and content with attempting to put the whole ordeal behind me. Looking back in hindsight, I’m just concerned that I missed an opportunity to prevent this guy from doing something similar to another driver on the road in the near future.</p>

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<p>I would have taken out my phone and called the police. At the very least your taking out a phone would probably have scared him off.</p>

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<p>Sounds very scary! It’s tough to say what one could or would do in similar circumstances. I don’t drive 80mph very often and even more rarely have reached 100mpg. Really hard to think or react at those speeds.</p>

<p>Definitely would have been good to call the cops or if you could find the police station or somewhere where it was very busy to pull in & report the other driver. Taking our your phone & taking a photo of the offender & his vehicle might have been a good move, but I don’t think I would have had the presence of mind to do this when I was creeped out. Sorry, have never had this experience you have mentioned. I would probably have slowed way down to 55mph or below & let other traffic come between me & the creep as you tried to do.</p>

<p>You might call your local police department & ask them for advice on what to do in the future if this comes up. It sounds awful!</p>

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<p>cuse- driving 80 while drowsy- you were a danger to everyone on the road.</p>

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<p>Responding to the OP and not hitting the other issues:</p>

<ol>
<li> Stay on the main road.</li>
<li> Call the police - use the speaker if necessary to avoid detection.</li>
<li> If there are others on the road, stay with them; try to avoid being alone with this driver.</li>
<li> Avoid any confrontation with the driver of the other car.</li>
<li> Finally, you don’t want this guy to pass you. Not that you want to speed to the point where you are driving unsafely, but having him behind you is annoying; having him in front of you can put you in a situation where he forces you to stop and you don’t want that.</li>
</ol>

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<p>I must be dumb but I don’t understand what kind of gesture you’re talking about. Could you explain? Are you saying he was trying to rob you? Sorry, I’m not getting exactly what happened here.</p>

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<p>I don’t understand how this incident went on and on without you phoning the police</p>

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<p>Rubbing his first two fingers and his thumb together?? That’s the only “money” gesture I can think of.</p>

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<p>I would have called the police. Now, make of the car and condition of the card is always important. If the guy was driving brand new BMW 5 series, it wasn’t likely he was going to hit your car. I would have just let him stay on my tail, and called the police.</p>

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<p>I agree with everyone that you should have called 911. First thing though is lock all your doors, roll up your windows and if you have stop in town at lights or something always stay at least one car length away from the car in front and stay to an outside lane, that way should the person get out of their car you have an escape route. This is the perfect reason to have a bluetooth cellphone, you can talk to the Police and still concentrate on driving, all they would want are your coordinates so that they can find you. Similar has happened to me on the highway but nearing a small town and the police told me drive to a specific location and told me they were sending a ghost car to get behind us and the marked car was waiting at the the meeting spot. The car harrasing me was cornered and was apprehended within seconds. I agree that you should never let them get in front of you and speeding only makes the situation worse, Slow down to the speed limit and it is easier when you are in front because you control the situation, even if he hits you or taps you from behind you can control it but when they are front they are in control. I am glad nothing more serious happened to you though. My D has been taught that if she is beeing followed never to go to her dorm or house until all is under control because that just lets the person know where you live.</p>

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<p>Much safer to pull into a rest stop and take a nap than set the cruise control for over the speed limit because you are sleepy.</p>

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<p>

Agree! I understand the OP was probably quite stressed, but it’s hard to imagine calling the police wouldn’t have been one of his/her first thoughts.</p>

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<p>I never ever put the cruise control on if I’m slightly sleepy. That just makes it even easier to fall asleep! Driving while drousy is dumb. Speeding while driving is even dumber.</p>

<p>But ignoring that, yes you should have called the police.</p>

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<p>Driving with the cruise control set at 80mph and you are drowsy?
Driving over 100mph and making a quick exit?</p>

<p>You are lucky you haven’t caused some innocent person’s death. You don’t get any kudos or admiration from me.</p>

<p>You provide so much detail and ask for advice. It’s obvious you should have called the police and stayed with other traffic. What’s your purpose in sharing this strange post, I wonder?</p>

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<p>I would’ve called the police right away. I worry also that this person is doing this to other drivers.</p>

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<p>Driving drowsy with the cruise control on 80? What the heck were you thinking?! Then driving over a 100? Life is not a movie. The people you could have killed are real people. I am just horrified. </p>

<p>You should have called the police.</p>

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<p>To clarify a little bit-</p>

<p>I was drowsy before I left home, but was sufficiently caffeinated before the trip back that I never felt tired on the trip. Driving at 80 mph may sound a bit fast, but this was a highway and traffic on it generally moves at 70-80 mph, so it wasn’t like I was blowing by people or anything. </p>

<p>The main reason I didn’t immediately call the police was that I didn’t want this guy to get any of my info. I figured that if he was going to be pulled over, I would have to stop as well to explain my story to the officer/file a report, and I didn’t want this guy to know anything about me (don’t you have a right to know your accuser?). That is why my main concern was just getting away from this guy, and taking an alternate route. </p>

<p>Whatever game this guy was trying to play with me, he decided to stop when I sped up. In hindsight this may have been a reckless move, but I had tried pretty much everything else short of calling the police. By quick exit, I don’t mean I flew onto the offramp or anything. Once I lost sight of the guy, I calmly took the first exit I saw and proceeded on my way. </p>

<p>The gesture he made at the redlight involved him rubbing his thumb and fingers together. I know that gesture means “give me money” or “I have money” (I use it myself sometimes), but had no idea why this guy was directing it towards me. </p>

<p>Anyways, my main reason for sharing this was to see the types of reaction/input I would get. Seems like most people are against my approach to the matter, so if it happens again I’ll have to heed some of the advice that people have posted on here.</p>

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<p>* posted speed limit was 55, but I was pretty drowsy and anxious to get back to school before I fell asleep so I had my cruise control set on 80.*</p>

<p>I was drowsy before I left home, but was sufficiently caffeinated before the trip back that I never felt tired on the trip.</p>

<p>So which was it?
Pretty drowsy or never felt tired?
Possibly your exhaustion was contributing to making reckless decisions?</p>

<p>It is weird how you were targeted though. I have never had that experience although I have been driving for over thirty years. I have had " interested" parties, motion me over and offer to " fix" scratches or dents in my car ( that would probably have fallen off as soon as the sun set), but nobody asking for money outright.</p>