No link, but there’s a really aggravating story in this week’s Washington City Paper.

Before the storm last week, a D.C. woman parked her jeep — legally — at a spot in the Woodley Park area. Just before the snow hit, D.C. transportation gurus decided to make her spot and those around it a “no parking” zone. As such, they gave her a “courtesy tow,” in which they move the jeep to a legal parking spot, then write down her tags so a dispatch operator can tell her where her car is — but only after she calls in hysterics to inquire.

Well, it seems that the city worker who towed the jeep wrote down the wrong license plate number. And so when the woman called to find out if she’d been towed, there was no record of it. By then the jeep had been moved several blocks over, and was completely covered in snow.

After a few days, the woman decided the jeep had been stolen, and so she filed an insurance claim. She paid $23,000 for the truck. After paying off her note, her insurance company cut her a check for about $2,000 — the difference between what she had paid off and the insurance company’s estimate of what the jeep was worth.

About a week later, D.C. police called the woman. They had found her jeep. Excited, she called her insurance company. One problem: since they had already cut her a check, the jeep was theirs. She was instructed that if she laid a hand on it, she’d be arrested for insurance fraud. The jeep was towed by the insurnace company and later sold at a dealers-only auction. She wasn’t even allowed to bid on it.

She tells the City Paper that she watched online, helplessly, as her jeep — with her possessions still inside — was sold to an anonymous dealer.

Before the “courtesy tow,” she had a $23,000 jeep. Now she has no car, but a check for $2,000.

For its part, the city of Washington, D.C. “apologized.” A city cop said “sorry” for the trouble, but that workers regularly miscopy plate numbers when towing.

“Happens all the time,” he said.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 3rd, 2003 at 8:41 am by Radley Balko and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.