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30 Day Impound Hold on Your Car – What’s VC 14602.7(a)?
If you are the registered owner of a vehicle and you, a loved one or someone you let borrow your car is arrested or detained for reckless driving (Vehicle Code § 23103) or evading arrest (Vehicle Code §§ 2800.1, 2800.2 or 2800.3), you may be served with an order under Vehicle Code § 14602.7(a), signed by a judge, authorizing a thirty day impound hold of your vehicle. Reckless driving, it should be noted, can be alleged for speeding over 100 miles per hour.
What exactly does this mean? Is there any way to challenge this and if so, how?
The order is permitted under Vehicle Code § 14602.7, which says, “(a) A magistrate presented with the affidavit of a peace officer establishing reasonable cause to believe that a vehicle, described by vehicle type and license number, was an instrumentality used in the peace officer's presence in violation of Section 2800.1, 2800.2, 2800.3 or 23103, shall issue a warrant or order authorizing any peace officer to immediately seize and cause the removal of the vehicle. The warrant or court order may be entered into a computerized database. A vehicle so impounded may be impounded for a period not to exceed 30 days.”
(A) When the vehicle is a stolen vehicle.
(B) When the vehicle is subject to bailment and is driven by an unlicensed employee of the business establishment, including a parking service or repair garage.
(C) When the registered owner of the vehicle causes a peace officer to reasonably believe, based on the totality of the circumstances, that the registered owner was not the driver who violated Section 2800.1, 2800.2 or 2800.3, the agency shall immediately release the vehicle to the registered owner or his or her agent.’
The registered owner of the car also has a right to know that such an impound is taking place and that he or she may challenge such a request.
Vehicle Code § 14602.7(c) provides, “[w]henever a vehicle is impounded under this section, the magistrate ordering the storage shall provide the vehicle's registered and legal owners of record, or their agents, with the opportunity for a post storage hearing to determine the validity of the storage.
(2) A notice of the storage shall be mailed or personally delivered to the registered and legal owners within 48 hours after issuance of the warrant or court order, excluding weekends and holidays, by the person or agency executing the warrant or court order, and shall include all of the following information:
(D) A statement that, in order to receive their post storage hearing, the owners, or their agents, are required to request the hearing from the magistrate issuing the warrant or court order in person, in writing, or by telephone, within 10 days of the date of the notice.
(3) The post storage hearing shall be conducted within two court days after receipt of the request for the hearing.
(4) At the hearing, the magistrate may order the vehicle released if he or she finds any of the circumstances described in subdivision (b) or (e) that allow release of a vehicle by the impounding agency. The magistrate may also consider releasing the vehicle when the continued impoundment will cause undue hardship to persons dependent upon the vehicle for employment or to a person with a community property interest in the vehicle.
It is unclear exactly how such a hearing is conducted. According to the Lomita Sheriff’s station, the hearing is similar to a “Stypmann hearing,” which is codified at Vehicle Code § 22852.
Stypmann v. San Francisco (9th Cir., 1977) 557 F. 2d 1338 is a federal Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruling considered the seminal opinion on the due process rights to notice and an opportunity for a hearing in connection with a garage man’s lien for towing and storage where the vehicle was towed without the owner’s consent. Stypmann was a 42 U.S.C. § 1983 civil rights class action against the city of San Francisco and several towing companies. It looked at the way vehicles were towed, stored and redeemed in California under Vehicle Code § 22851, particularly by police and recognized that such towing and storage fees increase daily despite an owner demanding a hearing.
Stypmann recognized that “[l]oss of the use and enjoyment of a car deprives the owner of a property interest that may be taken from him only in accordance with the Due Process Clause.” The court also recognized that there was no provision in the law to prevent the forfeiture of the car, for example by posting a bond.
The court then held that Vehicle Code § 22851 “does not comply with due process requirements.”
In response to Stypmann, the California Legislature enacted § 22852, which provides for a post-storage (post-towing) hearing. Notice of the right to a hearing must be personally delivered or mailed to the vehicle owner within 48 hours, excluding weekends or holidays. It sets a 10-day time limit from the date of the notice to request a hearing and provides for a hearing within 48 hours of the request, excluding weekends and holidays. The hearing may be conducted by the police, but not the cop that ordered the tow. Finally, it provides that the police must pay the towing and storage charges if “reasonable grounds for the storage are not established.”
Where such a hearing takes place (at a courthouse?) and who may attend such a hearing is not specified.
We present this article to educate the reader on his or her post-towing rights.
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