Abandoned cars or not?

[Station]

What is your reckoning on this?

 

 

Dumped about 20 metres from the entrance of a scrap yard, no front end, bumper on flat bed (as well as some other crap), blue nylon rope still attached to front, doors open, parked half on pavement. Tax disc says 02/12, still has reg plate on the back. There's also a TV stand on the passenger seat.

 

It's literally round the corner from my unit, but I'm not touching it other than leaving a note with my number on. Everything about it screams abandoned to me - what's the process for claiming it, before the gypsies get it or even the scrap yard takes it in.

But the way, I know the laws about this type of thing And I'm not daft. I'm not going to drag it anywhere.

[Matt]

V888 form to get current keepers address, write to them offering to buy it, wait for a reply and it will be gone by that point.

[purplebargeken]

There was an old car round by my way, had been abandoned on the road for a couple of years but never lifted (major miracle). I went to the cop shop gave them a letter of my intent to remove and store. Had a copy stamped by the plod. I removed it. Made enquiries, applied for a V5C. Never had any hassle. I kept plod informed along the way. Job jobbed. 

[nigel bickle]

Sadly, if the 'owner' decided he wanted it. Back, you- or the next keeper, would still lose it.

[Pillock]

I might start buying up really rotten mk2 Escorts, VW Campers and stuff. Leave it in a lay by, wait till it disappears and then wait a couple of years. I can then claim back my fully restored £40k car

[BavarianRetro]

I think that has been done. I'm sure I read somewhere about an abandoned car being restored and the "owner" getting it back. I'd have thought he'd have to account for the betterment though.  

[Pillock]

Why? He didn't ask for it to be improved, no way of making him pay for it. Simply a case of something being stolen, fiddled with and reclaimed.

[mercrocker]

Who owns the land?   We had an E18 5 series abandoned at work by a bloke who then left the company.   Letter to the DVLA keeper address from work with 14 days to collect pending sale to defray storage blah blah.  Two weeks later my BMW E18 owning  mate has a free spares car which was  actually picked clean (the car was pretty finished with, big dent in arse, shagged gearbox) in the company car park before being collected by the scrappy.  

[Station]

It's on a public road.

I'd go to the police but I feel they actually know less about it and they may try and kick off if I ask them, especially when I have to explain how it all works.

[Station]

Btw the little truck has a flat front tyre. If love one of these, if I somehow get it it would be nice, if I don't, I've lost nothing.

[Pillock]

You still can't go taking someone else's property, DVLA forms or not. Not until you have a receipt to say it has been sold to you, until then you're the keeper not the owner. Even though every other car for sale on eBay is a barn find without V5 or keys, it's not legal to just take it.

 

And while that's pedantic, the police are the kings of pedantry and the legal system is basically just a list of instructions to follow to the letter.

[Station]

Went to the police in Birkenhead.

They were unbelievably helpful, after explaining, the lad check the cars details and it belonged to a company in Stockport. Because it was uninsured, they were going to send a patrol car down there to check it out. The car would probably be lifted and recovered to a compound and wait until the previous owner got back to them. If not, then I suppose I could go through the DVLA to claim it. Not sure if I'd have to pay a storage fee, but can't be a lot for a few days, in relation to a 'free car'. Bare in mind there's a slim chance I could blag this, but at least it prevents pikeys HIABing it off if I don't. And it could actually be stolen (it wasn't reported as stolen on the system).

[AlabamaShrimp]

You still can't go taking someone else's property, DVLA forms or not. Not until you have a receipt to say it has been sold to you, until then you're the keeper not the owner. Even though every other car for sale on eBay is a barn find without V5 or keys, it's not legal to just take it.

 

And while that's pedantic, the police are the kings of pedantry and the legal system is basically just a list of instructions to follow to the letter.

I don't understand this. Why is a car different to other lost/abandoned things?

 

In all dealings I've had,If you report anything lost or found to the police is recovered they attempt to contact the owner and is none comes forward in 28 days then it's yours as the reporting person. If it's the police themselves that find it just goes to auction after the time limit.

[Pillock]

I suppose because with cars everything is documented. If you find a debit card the police won't let you just keep it after 30 days because there's a record of whose it is. Same with a phone, or your driving licence. If you lose cash, or a bike, or camera nobody has a record of who it belongs to.

[AlabamaShrimp]

It's securities that aren't returned and phones were up until very recently. Everything else you can have as far as I know.

 

If it was me and I wanted the car I'd take it and apply to the dvla then try and contact the owner as suggested. I'd be taking pictures of how and where I found it and I'd make sure I'd take it to court if they ever wanted it back. Just to say it's theirs after being abandoned and they want it back isn't good enough reason just to hand it over

[Pillock]

But maybe they've lent it someone, and the person driving it just left it there - the owners might want it back. Perhaps it has been stolen, but they're trying to get it back without the cops - firm buys van, lets employee use it and take it home, employee stops turning up for work, they lose van.

I know the common sense approach is to just document it all and apply for the docs, but there have been cases where it's all gone wrong - admittedly not as much of a problem for a scratty old van as it is for an Escort RS2000, but you need to buy the van.

 

The best way of doing that, it seems now, is to wait until the recovery firm who lift it come to sell it on through auction - then you will have a bill of sale, which means it's yours.

[Station]

You can't compare debit cards to anything else, it's the using that would be very illegal, like using a passport, it's fraud etc. You can't see every car as 'lost' but picking up a debit card off the pavement isn't a crime. Taking a car you've found is theft, it's as simple as that. Try explaining that to the police as they pulled you over on a spot check and nothing matches up, however much you explain, you're definitely going to have a trip to the police station, maybe at least. That why it's a good idea to go through the proper process to avoid getting in trouble with the police. It's not worth it.

[AlabamaShrimp]

this whole thread is getting far to complicated me... I'm out

[UltraWomble]

R v (Adrian) Small [1987] Crim LR 778.

The defendant was charged with theft of a car. He claimed that he thought that it had been abandoned by the owner because it had been left for over a week with the keys in it. The Court of Appeal ruled that he could not be guilty of theft if he had an honest belief to that effect, as if the car had been abandoned, the owner would not be 'deprived' of it.

 

THE MENS REA OF THEFT

1. DISHONESTY

s2(1)(a) - BELIEF IN LEGAL RIGHT If D mistakenly believes that he owns V's umbrella, his appropriation of it would not be dishonest whether his mistake, or ignorance, is of fact or law. Moreover, D will not commit theft where he appropriates V's umbrella in the belief that it belongs to X on whose behalf he is acting. Similarly, D would have a defence if he took a bicycle belonging to V, in order to recoup a debt, under the erroneous belief that the law permitted debts to be recovered in this way. The D's belief merely has to be honestly held, it does not have to be reasonable. As with all subjective tests, the more outlandish the D's honest belief is, the less likely he is to be believed.

s2(1)( - BELIEF IN THE OTHER'S CONSENT This might apply where D's car has run out of petrol, and D takes a can of petrol from his next-door neighbour V's garden believing that V would have consented had he known. Again the test is subjective. But D must believe not only that V would have consented to the appropriation but that V would have consented to the appropriation in the particular circumstances. D may believe that his next-door neighbour would consent to his appropriating a pint of milk from his doorstep when D himself had forgotten to leave an order for the milkman; but may believe that his neighbour would not consent to D's appropriating the milk in order to sell it at a profit to a thirsty hitch-hiker who is passing by.

s2(1)© - BELIEF THAT PROPERTY HAS BEEN LOST Again the test for the D's belief is subjective. As regards the question of what might be required by taking reasonable steps to discover ownership will depend partly on the identification available, the location in which it is found, and the value of the property. A person finding a £10 note in the street may well come within this subsection, unless he has just seen it fall from the pocket of V who is walking in front of him. Similarly, if D finds a suitcase containing £1m in the street one would expect him to make considerable efforts to locate the owner. It should be kept in mind that s2(1)© is concerned with what the D views as reasonable steps.

S2(2) - WILLINGNESS TO PAY For example, where D sees V's newspaper poking out of his letterbox, knowing that he would not wish to sell it, pulls out the newspaper, and leaves its price on V's doormat, D could be guilty of theft.

 

All interesting stuff, but probably of little help here. Pretty much everything belongs to someone.

[Matt]

If you lose cash, or a bike, or camera nobody has a record of who it belongs to.

 

That's why you store a list of the serial numbers of your valuables in an online document, that way if your six grand Canon 1D and £1500 lens/bike/PC/TV/whatever goes walkies and an identical one turns up in a second hand shop you can prove it's yours.

[sheffcortinacentre]

irrespective of ownership if its recovered & stored you'll be looking at £100ish rec fee & £25+ perday storeage.

outside a scrappy, been left for them, or stripped by them & left outside yard due to lack of room.

[vulgalour]

This discussion is the new Banger Racers.

[Station]

^ That is not the point of the thread, I was asking what the process is, and I have just done it.

[Lankytim]

Can't you tow it away and store it for safe keeping? Get the owner details from the dvla and ring them up to see what the craic is with it.

 

 

I bet 50p that as soon as you try to load it up on a trailer an interested party will appear and make themselves known.

[Cavcraft]

It's obviously been dumped (outside of opening hours) for the scrappy to have.