Car theft victim socked with city tow fees

Car theft victim socked with fees
C.W. Nevius

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

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First Tom Espinoza had his car stolen. Then he had to pay the city to get it back.

That ought to teach him to be a responsible citizen.

Two weeks ago, Espinoza was attending a high school fundraiser in North Beach. At some point, Espinoza realized that he'd had too many drinks to drive, so he called a taxi.

The ride ended up costing him an additional $330. That's because the next day his 1995 Nissan Maxima was missing.

"I got a call from the police dispatcher about 7 that night. He said the car was found and I could either pick it up in the next 20 minutes or they could tow it," Espinoza said.

Espinoza, who works at a Marina bar on weekends, was at work and couldn't get the car until the next day. He figured that car theft victims don't have to pay the towing, administration and storage fees.

Wrong. That used to be the law. When it made sense.

The city's administrative code used to say that if a car was stolen and recovered in the city, the owner was exempt from fees.

But in 2005, Mayor Gavin Newsom proposed that only city residents should get out of paying the fees, and it passed the Board of Supervisors 9-2. The reason was pretty obvious. According to FBI crime statistics, 5,758 vehicles were stolen in San Francisco in 2008. At $330 a pop, that could run into serious money.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/11/10/BAI21AHKDL.DTL&tsp=1

:mad:

Poor kid. Now that's what makes people hate gov't, when it acts stupid.

and most cities do charge for this.

in fact, SF gives it's own taxpayers a break on this, but most cities don't.

so SF is actually more generous than other cities.

and if anyone doesn't think this is fair, why is it fair for SF citizens to pay to move someone's private property so that this service is free to them (while parks, schools, public health and whatnot all get cut and reduced).

Were it not so profitable I doubt many cars would ever be towed,

it's ridiculous to insist a stolen car has to be moved within 20 minutes.

it's a racket for the towing co's.

the city wouldn't be overrun with junk cars if people were given a day to move their cars.

i don't think a cop waiting around by a stolen car for over an hour is the solution.

and I don't think many homicide detectives are tied up investigating auto theft

and priorities are priorities, and waiting around for car owners is lower than a lot of other things police are needed for. also for lots of good reasons, once a city identifies a stolen vehicle, it wants it moved ASAP.

and if the owner doesn't show up, then it will need to be towed.

it's not in the city's interest to leave it there for 2 hours or a day or whatever...it was the scene of a crime, locks may be broken, windows, etc. and cannot be left unattended.

racket.

then the city would lose money providing the tow.

is that fair?

stolen car -- in some jurisdictions, they even tow first, then call the owner.

one or two days is a reasonable time frame if the vehicle is parked in a safe location. twenty minutes is *not*.

it's government-sponsored extortion, & your apologetics about them needing to keep cars off the street & stolen property secure doesn't cut it. there are methods to accomplish all the things you note while giving the owner a fighting chance.

the owner could often hire a private tow & have the vehicle towed to where he wants it cheaper than the extortionists - who often tow it dozens or more miles out of area, forcing the owner to pay for *two* exorbitant tows.

& often he could just go to the car, get in, drive away.

all of this occurs because the cops don't give owners reasonable time to remove their vehicles. they *choose* not to for the $$$$ it generates, & can bite the big one so far as i'm concerned.

and you are advocating raising that cost.

good thing i'm not in the same room with you or you would probably have punched me at this point.

:evilgrin:

people enough time to get their vehicles without having to pay protection money.

please don't put words in people's mouths. it's annoying. & sometimes dishonest.

i don't know how you could take it seriously...which is why after i said it, i said that you would probably want to punch me.

i was simply kidding around on that part because you didn't say it needed to be free in your opinion, and i said, well, that would involve raising the cost for county residents who do in fact get the service for free.

i didn't mean to offend you and the ironic thing is that you were offended by the post i intended to be completely silly rather than the other ones.

anyway. didn't mean any harm. :hi:

it's not free to move that car.

he pays or everyone else pays.

it's not free. at a time when the city is laying off workers in every conceivable area and reducing services across the board, is free towing of cars something worth trading say, health care, road maintenance, bus and subway service?

giving him that free tow will come out of someone else's budget (which probably gives a low income person health care) or helps run a bus.

there is no reason to tow a parked car not otherwise obstructing traffic.

or maybe the doors won't lock.

or maybe when it was robbed, it was damaged to the point where it will not run properly or safely, in which case the owner gets there and can't move it.

then we bring the cop back for a second time (hard enough to get a police officer here when you need one) and in the meantime the car may be further vandalized, etc. etc.

San Francisco never disappoints,

Happened to my son nearly 15 years ago. His car was stolen in front of our house. 3 weeks later we get a call from the cops in another city. They had found the car and we had 20 minutes to come get it. THe city it was in was farther than 20 so we had to pay the towing fee.

It really pissed us off that they couldn't just tell us where the car was and tell us to come and get it within 12 hours; at least something reasonable.

They were recovered, no towing required, but the cops turned them over to the towing company instead of to us. We had to pay the towing company $90 for each one. I always felt like we were robbed twice.

Years ago I was in Arizona with some friends when their car was stolen by a tow-truck driver - the police wouldn't do a fucking thing and said to take it to small claims court.

The scam was they would tow any car they came across with out-of-state plates and figure the visitor would pay anything to get the car back and not raise a stink.

We being stupid teenagers decided the best course of action would be to break into the lot (a chain link fence and trailer in the desert) and just take the car ourselves.

We got away with it, but our fathers were not terribly impressed.

(of which it wasn't having many lately) is still down at the city impound lot. I reported it stolen promptly, and it was located AND TOWED a month later, many miles away, and the impound fees alone would have been several hundred dollars by the time I could have got there, plus it was almost certainly undriveable by that time (probably why it got abandoned), so I would have had huge towing fees to get it here from the lot, plus the money to fix what the thieves did, plus all the deferred maintenance it needed.

I said no thanks.

Oh, and I just got a bill for a ticket on it, too. Expired registration. $25. Because adding insult to injury is SOOOOO American.

Got to the cop station, with my Mom, who drove, as I didnt have a car, and the cop asked, did I bring jack stands? I railed at that pig in front of all his buddies. Made him feel like a stupid fuck.