Illegal Tow

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My question is, can a police officer tow your vehicle for not transferring the title into your name, if you bought it after the D.M.V. closed on a Friday?

My son bought a gray minivan from a friend after work on a Friday. My son’s friend gave him permission to drive the van home and told him to meet him at the D.M.V. on Monday so they could transfer the title together. A police officer, one with a huge attitude problem, pulled my son over 20 feet from his driveway and told him he was driving a vehicle with a stolen tag on it. The plate on the van was 486 BLV, and the “numbers” on the “year sticker” went to plate 486 BCV.

We called my son’s friend. He said he had written down the license plate number on a piece of paper and then handed it to the lady at the D.M.V. when he had renewed the tabs. He said the lady at the D.M.V. must have looked at the paper wrong and got 486 BCV out of 486 BLV. This is the only explanation we can come up with, because we know for a fact that this van and the stickers are not stolen. The police officer wouldn’t listen to any of it.

The gray minivan had full coverage on it and my son had permission to drive it home. My son has a valid driver’s license and an insurance policy which allows him to buy a vehicle on the weekend and legally drive it home. His friend, who sold him the gray minivan, has a valid driver’s license and full coverage on the minivan. The insurance papers were in the van.

The police officer would not let my son drive the 20 feet to his driveway, park the car, and wait till the D.M.V. opened on Monday. What he did do was write my son a ticket for not transferring the title into his name. He said, and I quote ,”I am going to write you only one ticket instead of writing you a bunch of other tickets that I could write.” He made it sound like he was doing my son a favor by writing him one ticket.

The police officer wrote my son the ticket, then had the minivan towed to an impound lot. Around here, that’s a hundred and twenty bucks for the tow and thirty bucks a day for storage. It might not be a lot of money to some, but its a good hit for my son.

As far as the “one” ticket he wrote goes, I thought a person had ten days to transfer a title.

This whole thing makes no sense.