But before any more money was paid out, authorities charged that there had been no accident.
And Parkchomchuk, whose two young children also were in the car on that evening, faced criminal charges.
Tuesday night, after about eight hours of deliberation, a Montgomery County Court jury rejected the story of the phantom car.
Parkchomchuk, of the 200 block of Rosemar Street, Philadelphia, was convicted of falsely reporting the accident to police and conspiracy to commit insurance fraud.
Parkchomchuk, who already is serving two to four years in Bucks County prison for statutory rape, is to be sentenced on the fraud conviction after a background investigation.
Lower Moreland Sgt. Stephen M. Neufer testified that in late 1991, police investigated five hit-and-run accidents that were considered suspicious.
Two of the five cases were turned over to the District Attorney's Office.
In the second case, Philip Vaisberg, 62, of Philadelphia, who claimed to have been involved in a similar accident in July 1991, is awaiting trial.
Neufer testified that the five accidents shared key characteristics, including no independent witnesses, a lack of roadway debris, the same insurance company and drivers who were Russian emigres.
Defense attorney Charles O'Connell 3d returned repeatedly to that last point, arguing that police had targeted Parkchomchuk because of his ethnicity.
Vassilis Morfopoulos, an automotive safety engineer with American Standards Testing in Conshohocken who testified for the prosecution, said that he had reviewed statements about the accident and photographs of the car for GEICO Insurance, and that the accident could not have occurred as the people in the car described it.
Morfopoulos said the car either hit a stationary object or was hit by a slow-moving object, such as a lawn mower.
Parkchomchuk, his wife, Galina, and one of the two other adult passengers testified through a Russian translator.
