Who was at fault in a fender bender involving LeAnn Rimes and another driver on Thursday? The paparazzi, according to the singer’s rep.

“Due to the overzealous and very dangerous paparazzi following her, LeAnn was involved in a minor car accident,” the rep tells People. “The police were called and fortunately everyone is safe.”

The drama unfolded when Rimes, 27, was leaving Santa Monica shopping mecca Fred Segal. She was soon surrounded by several dozen paparazzi who were “starting to circle around her car,” says a source close to the singer. “She was scared by all the paparazzi following her and did not look up for a second because she was looking out the side of her window, and she did tap into the back of the other car.”

Calling it a “really, really minor accident,” the source says Rimes called police and exchanged information with the other driver – who climbed inside the singer’s car to avoid the photographers. “They’re going to work things out privately,” adds the source. “But the police were called and everyone was fine.”

This isn’t Rimes’s first recent traffic tangle. On Aug. 21 she was in a fender bender in which police were called. A spokesman for the Los Angeles Police Department says that case – involving a “very minor scrape between two vehicles” – has been closed “because no crime was committed.”

Rimes has been a special subject of interest for the paparazzi over her relationship with new beau Eddie Cibrian, 36. Rimes recently officially split from husband Dean Sheremet. Cibrian has filed for divorce from his wife Brandi Glanville.

Source, Bauer-Griffin