Case Closed on Cobweb Caddie

The Case of the Cobwebbed Cadillac has come to a conclusion. This may not be big news in your neighborhood, but on a certain block on Bluebell Avenue in North Hollywood, this is the scoop:

The Weiners fought the law and the Weiners won.

That would be Sammy and Teri Weiner, a couple who recently returned home from a Caribbean cruise to celebrate their golden anniversary and discovered that their 1976 Cadillac Coupe de Ville was missing from its usual parking spot in front of their home. They were almost as dismayed to learn that it wasn’t stolen, but had been plucked by the Los Angeles Police Department in a sweep of (apparently) abandoned vehicles--and that it would cost $132.95 to bail their Caddie out of the tow yard.

Now, when Teri Weiner first called me to express outrage about this, only a week had passed since all of Los Angeles was riveted by the televised spectacle of police officers bravely risking their lives in a gun battle with bank robbers in North Hollywood. A grateful public had showered bouquets and candy on its famously beleaguered force. Somehow it seemed reassuring that a couple of taxpayers from roughly the same neighborhood would be so quick to take the LAPD to task over a parking violation.

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On another day I might have passed Teri Weiner’s tale to the Street Smart columnist. But this was not another day and, as I would note with uncommon candor, I had 20 column inches of space to fill. So after Mrs. Weiner told me her tale, I telephonically tracked down the cop who had ticketed her Caddie. Senior Lead Officer Reuben Derma amiably defended his actions, telling me about the cobwebs in the Caddie’s wheel wells. This was proof that the car had been parked in the same location for more than 72 hours and thus, under the law, was subject to towing.

Upon returning from a vacation and reviewing my mail, I learned in a letter from LAPD Capt. Richard D. Wahler, commander of the North Hollywood Division, that the Weiners would indeed be getting their money back. But judging from what some other readers had to say, not everybody would be pleased by this resolution.

A few readers, in fact, all but suggested that the Weiners behaved the way their name is pronounced--like whiners. They weren’t impressed by the Weiners’ golden anniversary alibi or other sentimental details like the disabled parking placard Officer Derma didn’t notice. These people say they are fed up not just with abandoned vehicles that junk up the streets, but vehicles that look abandoned.

“Personally I don’t think the police did anything wrong,” wrote James E. Hamilton of Tujunga. “They got a complaint about an abandoned car. They investigated the complaint, they properly marked the car and then waited 72 hours and then impounded the car.

“So Officer Derma didn’t see the disabled parking placard. Well, it wasn’t a handicapped parking space. I think it was wrong to put him on the defensive.”

Hamilton and others reasonably wondered why the Weiners didn’t move the car to the driveway before going on vacation, or perhaps leave a set of keys with a trusted neighbor.

Capt. Wahler explained how the car impound detail is a valuable part of the LAPD’s community-based policing efforts. Sweeps are conducted once or twice a year in response to hundreds of complaints.

“These vehicles oftentimes become targets of theft and vandalism creating not only eyesores, but hazards for children. . . . Certainly you are familiar with [UCLA sociologist] James Q. Wilson’s ‘Broken Windows’ concept. Abandoned vehicles are ‘broken windows’--left unattended, they tend to breed further deterioration to the community.”

Capt. Wahler also rose to Officer Derma’s defense. “I’m pleased that you obtained your ’20 column inches’ from Mrs. Teri Weiner,” Wahler wrote, adding that he regretted it came at the expense of “one of North Hollywood’s finest.”

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It should be noted that the Weiners won their impound hearing more on technical merit than a sympathetic ear. Police Sgt. Chris Thiffault says records showed that the car had been towed 70 hours after it was marked, not a full 72 hours. This provided what Capt. Wahler called “an amicable epilogue” to the tale.

Teri Weiner admits that the car had been there for many more days, if not weeks. Like many homeowners--and the Weiners have lived in the house on Bluebell for 35 years--they feel as though street parking out front is virtually their own, though of course it is public property.

Mrs. Weiner seemed shocked when I told her that some readers thought she was wrong and the cops were right. How could they think that, she wondered, when that Caddie had been out there for weeks without moving and had never been ticketed even once?