[Maestro]

Here is my take on it, and since you live in CA. The fact your crossed in front of him is the reason they are denying the claims. In most states even if you were in the wrong and the other person's front of their car hits you anywhere behind the front of your car it is their fault. However, in CA they are what is called assigned blame, meaning they can assign blame to the other driver for doing something that either caused the accident or they did not attempt to avoid the accident. In your case they are claiming you should not have crossed in front of him.

Also, since you are in CA, even if you called the police to get a report, they would have refused since it was on private property and the will tell you they have no authority on private property.

With that said, most insurance companies will automatically refuse to pay as standard practice and make you fight them. As you stated your insurance could care less since the $250 will not be paid by them no matter what so they have no interest in helping.

As a matter of the witness, who are they, were they passengers in his car. This could be a ploy on the insurance companies part so get their names and addresses and relationship to the driver.

The other thing you can do is file a claim in small claims court and hope the person nor his insurance company shows up and you win automatically and you show them the judgement and they most likely will pay since it now will become too costly to try and appeal the decision.

A friend of mine did this when a local mechanic totaled his BMW when he took it home for a joy ride, the insurance company for the muffler shop refused to pay since they claimed guy did not have permission to take the car they claimed he stole the car and therefore the insurance company had no responsibility. Well he took it court and the judge agreed with my friend and the insurance company did not show so he got an automatic judgement in his favor. The insurance attempted to appeal the decision but in the end they paid since it was going to cost more to fight.