Tondeleo: The conversation about using deer hair as insurance led into another one relating to auto insurance, this one which was a clumsy attempt at insurance fraud by one of Doc and Big Dave’s friends.
Doc: Yeah, Tondy, here’s one for you. A few years ago, Porky Burch got drunk and wrecked his pickup into a tree. He had insurance on it, which surprised me. It was a new truck, at least new for what it was. Probably maybe five years old, It was worth puttin’ insurance on, if you had the money. But anyway, Porky was drunk and didn’t want the cops in on it. I didn’t know all that at the time.
Anyways, he walked over to Duncan Williams’ house, we call him Dunk, and gets Dunk to run him over here. It was about three in the mornin’ at that time. Porky asks me to come and drag his car over here and sit it behind my shop till he could get it fixed.
So I get out my loggin’ chains and we ride over there in my panel truck and we drug it back onto the road, and Marilyn sat behind the wheel to steer it, cause Porky was still drunk, and we drug it home and set it behind my shop. No problem.
Well, he came by and took his stereo and speakers out of it. Then it sat back there for a couple months and one night Porky and Dunk came by. They’d been drinkin’ and said they was takin’ Porky’s truck. They had Dunk’s father-in-law’s truck and a chain. I asked about how come he weren’t getting’ me to fix it and he said he WAS, but he had to take it somewhere first.
Well, what they did was, they towed it about ten miles on that chain, and then pushed it up against a tree, like it had just wrecked into the tree. Porky also put a guitar what he had broke one time when he was drunk and mad, and he put it in the passenger seat, like it had got broke in the accident.
Then, they went to Scott’s Store and used the pay phone out front to call the Sheriff, to report it stolen! Porky said he’d been in Scott’s all evenin’ and when he came out, his truck was gone! He was drunk, but he weren’t drivin’ so the cops let him alone on that one.
He told the cops what it looked like, Tondy, and they started lookin’ for it. About two hours later, one of ‘em found it, smashed into that tree!
Now, Porky figured he’d be able to get some ‘surance money out of it, and then they could bring it to my shop and get me to fix it for about half what he got paid for it! I didn’t know that at the time neither.
But guess what?
Tondeleo: What?
Doc: The cops called a tow truck. Tow truck driver pulled it back from
the tree. Then they looked inside, and the keys was in it! Not Porky’s WHOLE key ring, cause he needed his other keys, just his truck keys! His keys were in the ignition, Tondy!
And the radio was missin’, but taken out real neat! And his guitar was in its case in the front seat! The case weren’t tore up! Just the guitar in it was broke up!
Worser than that, where the paint had gotten knocked off when he wrecked it a couple months before, was all rusted! And worser than that, the tree where they had pushed it into, wasn’t even scarred up or hurt! They had just pushed it up against the tree!
The cops figured out right quick what happened.
They went to Porky’s house to tell him they found his truck. Of course, Porky had drunk another couple of beers, thinkin’ about all that insurance money he was gonna get.
All they said was, “Mr. Burch, we found your truck…”
Old Porky’s first words to the cops was, “Did they wreck it real bad? I hope they ain’t stole my radio, it was worth a thousand bucks, which it weren’t, he’d got it on sale at the Wal-Mart. And then he kept sayin’ “How about my guitar? Was it broke up real bad?” and stuff like that.
The cops said it looked like it’s been wrecked a good long time, and that there was no skid marks, no damage to the tree or the guitar case, and whoever took the radio did a real careful job on it.
Porky kept sayin’ it had just been stole, and what was they gonna do to get him his insurance money for his truck, his radio and his guitar and was they gonna get him a rent a car.
Then the cops talked about lockin’ him up for lyin’ and filin a false report and a bunch of other stuff. Dunk said Porky just hung his head and cried like a baby!
I know he got charged with somethin’ on that one. He had to go to court. And he never got the money to fix it, neither! It sat back there in his back yard for a couple years. I ain’t never fixed it. He traded it for a old 4 by 4 that was a piece of junk, but it run good. Now that’s crazy ain’t it? Drinkin’ don’t pay. Not in the long run.
