Obviously I'm not ALONE!

I found this online:

I'm in Massachusetts, and I've been researching this. So far, I've found no authority for the police to tow a vehicle merely because it has an expired sticker. However, it is clear that they routinely do it.

In some towns, there are explicit local ordinances governing the towing of abandoned vehicles. If a vehicle is parked in a public way, and it has an expired sticker, it may be considered abandoned. However, with what I've seen so far, the police must place a sticker on the car warning that it will be towed if not moved within a certain period, two or three days I think. Only if the car is parked in such a manner as to constitute a hazard can it be towed immediately. And that is true whether or not the registration is expired.

In the situation that aroused my interest, my wife was driving to pre-school with two small children (ages 2 and 4). She was stopped on the next business day after the tags expired. Indeed, I'd intended to get the tags the previous week, but we just adopted one of these children and the family is ... making adjustments. Bottom line, even though I only had to go downstairs to renew the registration, with two screaming children and a wife who was pretty much losing it, a few things did not get done that week. Had we not lived upstairs from the RMV, I would have, in fact, mailed it in and there would have been no problem.

So she was stopped, and she parked the car at the side of the road in a place where there was no hazard and no apparent parking regulation. The officer told her that he was going to tow the car, so take the children out. He was apparently ready to leave her and the children by the side of the road, with traffic whizzing by. Two children, both ready to run in any direction at the drop of a hat. However, she had a cell phone and called me and I arrived. We removed the car seats from her car and put them in mine, and proceeded to take the children to school. Of course, they did go ahead and tow the car. Now, the question is, why? They issued her a $100 citation, which is the statutory fine for the violation of driving with no registration. The law is unclear on the point of whether or not expired tags are "no registration," but obviously it is being considered that way. (Expired registration is not identical to no registration, on the face of it.)

If she had stopped the car in a place where there was a hazard, it is clear that Mass law would allow the officer to direct her to move it according to his instructions.

Now, she was violating the law by driving the car. It is also a violation of the law for the car to be parked in the public way. However, routinely, and by regulation in at least some towns, cars parked in the public way with expired tags are not immediately towed. In other words, the "violation" is allowed to continue for a certain period of time, allowing for notice and correction. It would appear that towing a car in the circumstances described would be a punitive action. Or, more darkly, corrupt. Towing generates local revenue.

In most states, driving with an expired sticker is not a moving violation, and it appears that most states do not tow for this reason alone. Indeed, most states seem to routinely give warnings that turn into real citations, with fines, if the violation is not corrected. That's what I expected would be the case here. Had I not expected this, instead of rushing to the scene to help her, I'd have gone downstairs and registered the car and would have taken the plates to the scene, so the car being towed would have had current registration on it; in fact, I'd have gotten there before the tow truck. In most jurisdictions, if the tow truck were called legitimately, this would be half-charge. Further, the officer confiscated the plates. That created a whole extra difficulty, since the officer, even though only minutes away from the station, did not return the plates to the station so we could pick them up for three or four hours.... And the police at the station complained that they had too few officers for the work load.

Of course, they *created* the work load, this particular part of it. It took two officers about thirty minutes to finally get the children into the second car and see the tow truck off.... (The arresting officer called for backup, I suspect, when I arrived. I'm sure I was not smiling at him when he confirmed that, no matter how much trouble this was causing, he "had" to tow the car.)

In any case, we will contest the citation and we are informed by an attorney -- as well as my own experience before magistrates and judges in Massachusetts, that the probable outcome on the citation is that it will be dismissed, when we show the registration and the timing of it. We still had to pay $110 for the towing and minimum storage to get the car back. And, unless I can find authority in the law for the police to tow the car under the circumstances, I'll be filing a claim against the town for reimbursement for costs. My attorney friend, an ex-cop actually, tells me that I could go for more than that. The children were pretty upset!

So people in some forums have asked about this situation and how it might affect their insurance rates. Massachusetts is unlike most other states. This is considered a minor violation, but it *can* affect rates. Essentially, a major violation, like speeding or going through a red light, is five points. Expired tags is two points. If I'm correct, the average cost in insurance of simply going ahead and paying the citation is about $400 over the period before it becomes moot.

Out of Control!

Left for work early Saturday morning. Was meeting a friend before my manicure and then had to get on to the store.....it wasn't raining - which was a real treat! The sun was shining - it was going to be a great day!
I dropped off some packages at the Post Office and hopped back into my car anxious to get back to my story on my iPod - Sarah's Key - excellent! Just as I was starting up the police officer knocked on my window. "Let me see your registration" - ahhhh - who needs this? So I grabbed the papers from my glove compartment (I love that term - reminds of days of old) and could not find it among the various old registrations, warnings, etc.). Told him that I couldn't find it but that I had to have had it when I was recently given the warning that my front headlight was out. Whatever - he told me that I could not drive my car as it was not registered. Gee! OK - I said that I will take the car home and use my husband's car for the day and that we'll take care of the situation on Monday. "OH NO" said the town policeman! "You're not driving this car anywhere". "Come on" I said - "it's a mile from here - I will drive it home". Under no circumstances was he going to allow me to drive the car. He told me that I had to get a tow truck to get my car home. I pleaded with him - to no avail. I told him that I felt that he was harassing me! At which point he told me how lucky I was that he wasn't giving me a ticket.
Now you have to understand how small this little town is - the entire "downtown" consists of the Post Office and the General Store and on a Saturday in the summertime - the little "downtown" is quite busy - people all around - cars all over - busy busy busy! Everyone was watching this little scene and when the officer decided to take the plates off of my car - I felt like a common criminal must feel. I was horrified! YES - he took the plates off of my car!
I called my husband and told him to "get down here quickly" - It cost me $125 to tow my car the one mile from the Post Office to my home and now my car is sitting outside my home without any plates.
I have spoken to many many people since this event on Saturday - many of whom have been stopped because of an expired registration - they can tell from looking at your license - ALL of them received WARNINGS! No one had been told that they couldn't drive their cars and absolutely NO ONE had the plates taken off of their car.
I have had trouble sleeping these last few nights - the outrage of what this police officer did to me has had a profound effect on me!
Why would he do what he did?
I tried calling the police chief today but he is out on vacation for a week - hopefully I will get some sleep in before he gets back to town.

Oh, do you know when my registration expired? The day before - not even 24 hours had passed that the registration was expired!

Honest Ebay Sellers are Held Hostage

That's right - that's what has happened! I understand that Ebay has been working hard to help the buyer from being cheated by people selling counterfeits - that's a good thing! In the process they have really hurt the honest seller. In so many ways - more than I can even talk about here right now.

But one thing that has happened is that someone buys something on ebay - gets a great deal and then holds the seller up for a "discount" because of some minor little thing - doesn't even have to be a real thing - just that the buyer knows that the seller can't leave him negative feedback. So he tells the seller that all is well but will be better with a $30 refund. Like the gal who held me up because the shoes were 1/2" higher than she thought. Even though my measurements were correct. Funny how she could wear them with a REFUND! It would have cost me money to have them come back to me and I stood the chance that she would leave me negative feedback! She leaves me negative feedback for no reason and there is NOTHING that I can do about it.

How annoyed was I? But what did it matter - she had me over a barrel and she knew it.

In talking with other sellers I am starting to see that this is what buyers are doing - nasty! OK - 99-9/10% of my buyers are fabulous and would never do such a thing. But that tiny percentage can really wreak havoc with a seller's feedback percentage.

SCARY!