I feel your pain man.
same thing happened to me bout 1 1/2 years ago.. i had a 94 starlet gt (back then they were worth bout 15,000) and my mate drove it into a fence... i also had no insurance as i didnt think i would ever need it. Worse yet he bailed on me, ive never seen him since and havnt seen a cent for the car.
Hope everything works out for ya