FENDER BENDER.(The Talk of the Town)(Saab Guy and Michael Schur's charitable donations)

One afternoon a few weeks ago, Jennifer Philbin, a writer for "The O.C.," was driving her BMW in heavy traffic on Wilshire Boulevard, in Los Angeles, when she passed the remnants of an accident. She turned to look and promptly ran into the car in front of her--a Saab wagon. She and the Saab's driver, a man in his late forties, pulled over to assess the damage. There didn't seem to be any; she had hardly been moving. Nonetheless, the man insisted on summoning a police officer. Eventually, one came over from the other accident, examined the Saab's bumper, and said, "I don't really see anything here." The driver of the Saab, citing possible "structural damage," was adamant. The policeman filled out an accident report.

These particulars, and many that followed, came to light the other day, thanks to the efforts of Philbin's fiance, Michael Schur, a twenty-nine-year-old Harvard graduate and a writer for the NBC sitcom "The Office," who converted his indignation over the fender bender into a campaign both to embarrass the Saab driver and to raise money for the victims of Hurricane Katrina. In two mass e-mails, and then on a blog, he dissected the incident and its moral implications, striving to turn his inner Larry David into an inner Augustine, or, at least, an inner Oprah.

Schur's involvement began several days after the accident, when Saab Guy, as Schur christened him, called Philbin to report that there was a crease in his bumper's plastic cover and that it would cost $836.96 to fix. This news prompted Schur to commandeer the phone and demand digital photos.

The man responded, according to Schur, "It really isn't the kind of thing that shows up in a photograph."

So instead Schur paid a visit to the garage at Saab Guy's office. ("It might not surprise you to find out that the man is a lawyer," Schur's e-mail said.) Together, the two men inspected the car. "I kid you not," Schur wrote. "You have to be within six inches of the bumper to see the 'crease.' "

Saab Guy told Schur, "Look, I could live with it, but I just don't want to." Schur pointed out that petty accident claims contribute to skyrocketing insurance rates.

"I don't care about insurance rates," the lawyer replied.