The Fight Against Crime: Notes From The Front : Unlicensed, Unregistered to Be Target

Scofflaws beware.

If you think you’re going to get away with driving without a license or letting your automobile registration expire in the San Fernando Valley, you may have made a costly mistake.

Los Angeles police have mounted a special campaign in the Valley to hunt you down. If they catch up with you, the fines and penalties will be a major pain in the wallet.

Since January, an estimated 1,500 vehicles have been impounded at Valley tow yards, either because their registrations were expired for more than six months or they were being driven by unlicensed drivers, according to LAPD Capt. Alan Kerstein, commanding officer of the Valley Traffic Division.

Kerstein said he’s been dispatching special details of 10 to 15 officers to sweep an entire police division in search of automobiles with expired registration tags in an effort to reduce the number of hit-and-run accidents, which total as many as 7,000 a year in the Valley alone.

“We’ve found there’s a direct correlation between unregistered vehicles, drivers who are unlicensed, and hit-and-run crimes,” Kerstein said.

Such drivers, Kerstein said, have a “natural tendency to panic and flee the scene of an accident” because they know that staying at the scene would lead to problems over their legal right to drive.

In such cases, it’s usually the law-abiding licensed drivers, the ones who register their cars and buy insurance, who end up paying for the collisions, while the corner-cutters get away free, Kerstein said.

“The bottom line is that drivers in the San Fernando Valley and the rest of the city, for that matter, who keep their cars registered deserve the protection of the Police Department from those who don’t,” he said.

Consequently, Kerstein said, as many as 140 vehicles are sometimes impounded during a single eight-hour sweep of a Valley police division. During the same period police have also been cracking down on unlicensed drivers and those who drive with a suspended or revoked license.

“A good number of people drive without a license and that’s what we want to discourage,” Kerstein said.

Unlicensed drivers caught in Kerstein’s net lose their vehicles for 30 days, pay a $65 impound fee and $13.50 daily storage fees to the towing company, a $40 release fee to the city, plus taxes and hefty fines for violating the law.

The fine for driving unlicensed, for instance, ranges from $125 to $200.

Those caught with expired registrations of more than six months face fines and their vehicles are impounded, but the vehicles can be reclaimed as soon as their registration is renewed.

The crackdown appears to be working.

Since the sweeps began last year, the number of hit-and-run crimes in the Valley dropped by 15%--1,500 incidents--contrasted with 1994. So far this year, the number of hit-and-run offenses is down another 7% in the Valley.

Kerstein cautioned that drivers who have a valid license but simply do not have it with them when they are pulled over by police will be cited for not having it in their possession, but their vehicles will not be impounded.

He also said if a vehicle’s registration has been expired less than six months, the drivers will be cited, but their vehicles will not be impounded. But all vehicles with registrations lapsed for more than six months will be impounded, unless they are parked in a garage.