Hot Rods Stolen car... But I have title?

metalmunchr has it right DO NOT transfer the titles to your name until resolved. at least right now you have a notarized and dated open "to be transfered" document. send those in and there goes a big portion of you back up. it's been a while since i paid the "failure to transfer in 10 days" fine but from memory i think it was a whopping $2 last time i did. with NC's "assigned values" i held off on stuff to avoid paying the tax which is usually as much or more than the title........ken......

 

Something really fishy here, seems to me if there isnt somthing to what the nephew is saying or doing he could be in big trouble himself for pulling this crap,does he feel like his uncle was swindled out of the cars or???

 

The longest I've ever waited, to get a title put my name, was 48 hours and that's because I bought the car on a Friday evening.

Life lesson.

 

I'd hang both their asses here; the "Nephew" making false theft report and the Deputy for showing up with a wrecker and no warrant to take your property. If you don't get anywhere with the DA's office or Police Chief, threaten to go to the press and the State attorney's office.

 

It's NOT an "open title" if a buyer's name has been entered in the buyer/purchaser section if the title.

It is only an "open title" if the seller has signed off and the space for the buyer's name is left blank or 'open'...............allowing for the universally illegal 'title jumping'........passing a vehicle through several hands without each owner taking proper title to the vehicle. According to the OP, that is not the case here.

Threads like this are somewhere between "amusing" and "this makes my head explode" with all the pseudo 'legal opinions' and overwrought bravado from people who aren't actually facing the situation. This is supposed to be a hot rod forum, not WWE promo tryouts...........

Ray

 

So someone can steal a car. Hide it for 15 years and it's theirs? Nonsense! There's been dozens of decades old recoveries of classic cars, some that had been fully restored and gone through various owners only to end up "recovered" and returned to their owner whom it was stolen from.
Your friend needs to lawyer up. Was he paid off via insurance at the time of the theft? If he was, the insurance co. has claim to the stolen car.

 

A BUNCH of "internet trained legal experts" spouting all kinds of UNTRUE things in this thread. I would recommend actually knowing what you are talking about before giving specious advice. To the OP get a lawyer that knows what he is talking about and you can get damages for your expenses from this guy and or the police IF you are correct in what you are posting. Ignore the cop haters and do things legally.

 

Not being familiar with Titles down here as they are not required, only bills of sale, how did he get your personal details and the VINS, are these public domain documents that anyone can access for a fee? My understanding is that titles in your name gave you clear ownership and that the vehicle was either encumbered or not. How can you transfer a stolen title as you don't have ownership in the first place?

 

That hits every point. Amen

 

That's right cuz cops are sooo helpful.

 

See what I mean. So what is incorrect about my advice oh learned one? Did I say go to the police? What is your advice... oh I see a totally incorrect thing to do: To wit

"Best get both of em tagged in your name. Similar thing happened to a friend of mine. He traded his Nomad for a 68 Charger with clear title. Unbeknownst to him the guy had taken the the Charger out of state and titled it with a bill of sale. The sheriff showed up with the owner and was scratching his head over two titles. The dude LAUNDERED his car. The initial owner got his car back and my friend was out $1800.00 which was real money in 1970.
The difference is that the VINs matched in my friend's case. Also it sounds like the cop is in cahoots with the guy (friend or kin) to show up at a residence with a wrecker based on here say.
I had a guy do the same thing about 3 years ago on a damned old 87 Caprice. He didn't even have the year right."

Ya see what I mean IF the man follows your specious advice and changes paperwork post facto (after he was informed the cars MAY be stolen) it would be considered by the court to be evidence of CONTINUING A FRAUD not a case of mistakenly buying POSSIBLE stolen vehicles so he would be WORSE OFF following your advice than before.

When talking about law of the land first one must be correct, precise and knowledgeable (of which you are neither) as anyone following the 2nd amendment battle knows how the placement of just one comma can make all the difference in the law. Same with giving advice without knowing the precise facts of any case.

 

Was an interesting discussion, turned into a pissin match, been there,done that!
Good luck getting any help from officials!

 

As long as the cop isn't in cahoots with the nephew, seems like you should be good, cars vins match your titles and not his. It sounds like you're certain the cars aren't stolen. But I agree with the idea to hide them or block them in.

I went through a similar situation with an O/T '72 Nova posted on eBay; a guy emails up and wants to know the VIN because he had a '72 SS stolen a couple hours away in 1985. He even went so far as to call the police, who sent a guy out. Never mind this car was not an SS and had a different vin begin sequence because of it. But it looked just like his car, I guess along with a million others Chevy painted that color. Explained to the cop it was likely a scam, and that was the end of that.

IMHO what some of those guys must be after is a clear VIN correct for another car that's stolen or salvage/totalled, that is not in a computer system, and not likely to be for some time, because the car was not worth someone coming from Kansas to New York to steal - it had no motor, the interior was gutted, etc. NYS doesn't title '72 and older and even when registered if they're inactive for 5 years or so they're dropped from the computers. So if they stamp up a tag with a VIN they know is good, they can register the car. And this guy asked for the VIN about 10 times.

I'd keep copies of the original titles before putting them in my name.

 

It's time to contact a lawyer because this is going to get sticky fast!!!!!!!!!

I am not sure which one of you legally owns the cars at this point.

I do know that just because you have a tittle and the vins are correct does not mean you legally own the two cars.

Who legally owns the cars will be decided in a court room. I also would like to know how long you have owned the two cars and just how you came into possession of the two cars.

Another question is how did the person who is claiming to be the rightful owner know you had the cars if they had not been for sale?

This would not be the first time I have seen someone who thought they legally purchased a car from someone loose it because it was indeed stolen from someone else. Creating New tittles as certainly been done before and changing vin tags as been around for years.

Whenever I see someone at a car show taking more then just a few photo's of someone car I start thinking it will appear of E-Bay for sale.

I know one car collector who has been purchasing cars for years who lost $32,000 dollars to an E-Bay car scam and he had checked out many different sources for references for the car and the owner along with contacting E-Bay first to make sure the sale was legit only to loose his money in the end.

The FBI got involved trying to track down where his money went and after tracing it through many different wire transfers and states they determined the person who pulled off the elaborate scam was located in Iowa and had pulled the same scam on seven other car buyers in the past few years.

I hope you win the cars but that is something that will be up to the courts.

Jimbo

 

"The guy" - who happens to be the nephew of the seller, says that the seller Had no right to sell the cars.

Unless the nephew knows something about his uncles compunction or competency to sell his (uncles) belongings and you paid a fair price that doesnt equate to "stole it", there's nothing here.

Ever see the movie "bad seed" ?
Gramma can I have your birdie when you die? Uncle Bibby, can I have your 55 chevies when you die?

 

I can see not wanting to bag on the deputy in an open forum, but fuck it, I will. He needs to be discharged from the Sheriff's Dept. I lost out on purchase that a misfit son tied up in court for 2yrs. The seller ended up with the car but it cost him about $9K in legal fees and 2yrs of hearings and discoveries. He had no legal recourse to get the $9K back so he had that much more in the car, and more than I wanted to pay to complete our original deal. I graciously backed out and what he had was probably worth $9K more but not to me.

Nephew? Well fuck him too since he's trying to fuck you out of the cars after the fact. Get a consultation from a good shyster and proceed from there, and maybe even rat out both the nephew and deputy to higher authorities. As for discussing it here, this ("...supposed to be about hot rods...") is a good place for such discourse as many of us have gone through legal fecal piles in the past. Good ideas can come from honest and open commentary. Despite wanting to be a genuine "car guy" and play along you need to nail those who fired this up against you. It wouldn't be impossible or reaching to get a dispatch record from the towing co. You have a car shop so I'd think you can speak the same language and get the extra info to prove the attempt at scamming you out of the cars. Good luck, but you're a dick if you don't tell us how it ends up. Just sayin...

 

The OP definitely needs a lawyer (one of my lawyers is a car guy..). People are less inclined to fuck with you if they know you have a lawyer backing up your interests. Especially if its a shady deal like this one.

 

I would visit the local sheriff's office inquire about what is going on. If it is shady they won't know anything about it and it will raise flags there. If its legit they should be able to at least inform you of the claim against you. If they give you any trouble find the cheapest dirtbag lawyer in town and put him on retainer for $100.

 

I hope we get to hear (read) how this ends. If in fact, the deputy is trying to pull some shit for a buddy or relative, he should swing. There're so many scenarios this could play out to right now, it's hard to call it.

Deputy, legit or not
Nephew, " " "
Uncle, " " "
OP, " " " (sorry man, that's the way the courts gonna look at this)

All for a court to sort out eventually I suppose.