Motorist Endures Rocky Road to Get $247 From DMV

Larry R. Parker wore a million-dollar smile Wednesday even though the judgment he won from the state Department of Motor Vehicles was a mere $247.01

For Parker, the decision signaled victory in a two-year battle with the state agency, which admitted botching his truck’s registration, causing it to be impounded, and then refusing to refund his costs, arguing that he had submitted the wrong form to get a refund--a form the DMV had given him.

On Wednesday, the agency announced that it would stop devoting thousands of dollars in state resources to avoid paying the picayune sum.

“We realize we are responsible for part of the problems he had,” said Bill Madison, a DMV spokesman in Sacramento. “We can [now] go our way and not spend state money behind this litigation.”

“I’m happy that they’ve finally seen their error,” said Parker, moments after his attorney announced in Orange County Superior Court that the DMV had decided to pay up to settle the case. “It’s ridiculous that the state took a small matter like this to these lengths.”

The brief court hearing Wednesday before Orange County Superior Court Referee Greer H. Stroud was the latest round--and quite probably the last--in a protracted battle between Parker and the DMV.

It began in January, 1994, when Parker paid $1,758 in registration fees for his GMC truck and a second vehicle. A clerk at the DMV office in Westminster told him at the time that he would need a smog check for his 1961 pickup before he could receive his new tag.

The smog check requirement surprised Parker because he had never needed one before on a vehicle that old. Vehicles originally registered before 1966 do not require smog certificates.

Although DMV officials eventually acknowledged that Parker did not need the smog check, Huntington Beach police had already towed the truck because of “incomplete registration.”

A DMV supervisor later apologized for the mistake and gave Parker a claim form to recover the $137 it took to get his impounded truck back from the police and another $74.01 for transportation expenses and time lost at work.

When the DMV rejected his refund request, Parker marched off to small claims court and won a $211.01 judgment against the DMV, plus the $22 it had cost him to file his claim in court.

To the surprise of Parker and legal experts, the DMV enlisted the California attorney general’s office to appeal Parker’s small-claims victory. Stroud reversed Parker’s small-claims judgment.

Parker appealed. He came to court Wednesday with attorney Michael B. Stone of Seal Beach, who offered his services for free after reading a newspaper story about Parker’s plight.

Stone told the court Wednesday that Ruiz had finally agreed to settle the case for $233.01, plus $14 for the costs of filing the latest motions.