HOA Nut House

KVBC-TV | Darcy Spears

Towed away and held for ransom

Taking your car and holding it hostage for ransom. People who believe they've been victims of "carnapping" claim their vehicles are being illegally towed; taken from private property under business agreements between tow companies and homeowner associations or apartment complex management companies.

And as News 3 Investigator Darcy Spears uncovered, the culprits may have accomplices.

In the dead of night, a fleet of flatbeds arrives at the Bella Vita condo complex to load up with cars and prepare for a mass tow. Because a Metro cop who lives there put out a notice about this night, we were there with our cameras rolling.

The notice is a warning to all residents that the HOA planned to tow 72 cars at once. The cop writes, "As many of you know, they like to tow cars for no reason," and he suggests the HOA gets a kickback from the tow company.

The tow guys work for Day & Night Towing. They and all other valley towing companies are regulated by the Nevada Transportation Services Authority. Private property tows are the largest single complaint the state handles. In the last six months, they've gotten complaints on twentyseven tow companies, and they've validated more against Day & Night than any other. Maybe that's why the drivers shine their headlights in our camera to block our view of what they're doing.

"I had my car towed illegally. I had a moving permit in it."

Despite that, Bella Vita resident Joshua Murphy had to shell out $220 to get his car back. In the case of another Bella Vita resident, a judge agreed, granting a small claims verdict for the homeowner against complex manager RMI for $1,000 plus court costs. RMI refused to return our repeated phone calls for comment, so we paid them a visit in person.

"We can't comment, because we haven't gotten permission from the association to comment. The man would only identify himself as "Kevin."

Darcy: RMI doesn't have anything to do whatsoever with any of the towing or the enforcement, or...?

Kevin: We administer it. Sure.

Darcy: You administer it.?

Kevin: Sure, absolutely.

Darcy: But you can't talk to me about it?

Kevin: Can't talk about it.

Metro can, however. "If a homeowners association is acting within the scope of their agreement, I've got no problem with that," explains Metro's Lieutenant Robert Duvall. "If the homeowners agreement is providing an avenue for a tow company to come in and illegitimately tow a car and either hold it hostage and run up some bills or something like that, then I'm gonna get involved."

Bella Vita is just one of many complexes in town that uses Day & Night Towing. David Libuszowski had a run-in with them when he lived at the Renaissance Apartment complex on West Tropicana. "...went over to check on my boat one day and noticed it had been missing."

News 3 obtained a list of vehicles Day & Night towed when they took David's boat and trailer. And even though the law requires it, DMV records confirm they never notified David. "They didn't notify Metro either," David said.

That's another violation of state law. By not letting anyone know, the tow company can keep your vehicle and rack up storage charges until you figure out what happened on your own. "I called up our management and our management said (yes), it had been towed for non-registration."

But David's boat and trailer were registered and are current through May of this year. When he went to pick them up, "I actually showed him the proof that it was an actual valid registration. I even had the registration in my hand to show him, hey, it's a valid sticker on there. And he didn't care. He didn't even want to see it."

They claimed his sticker wasn't valid, but couldn't prove it, because though they list his license plate number on their tow sheet, the plate itself went missing from their tow yard.

What might speak loudest in this story is the silence of the tow company and some of the management companies. Con Am manages the Renaissance apartment complex and while both they and Day & Night claim that it is in the right and can prove it, no one will show us any paperwork. Con Am flat out refuses to go on camera and Day & Night tells us, "No matter what we say, we just can't look good."

"I kinda felt that they're in... basically in cahoots with each other," David told News 3. "There's something mysterious about it because at first the Day & Night Towing wanted $800 to get my boat out of impound."

But his complex manager got that cut in half with a phone call. "And I was thinking to myself, wow, you know that's kind of weird; a legitimate business does not lower their rates like that." In fact, they're not allowed to. They're required to charge their published rate and can't bargain down for cash.

"I believe it is a big scam going around Vegas," David claims. "If there's a legitimate issue out there with a vendor that's not doing their job or doing it incorrectly or illegally, oh man, I don't want to be involved in that."

Bella Vita residents tell us no mass tows have taken place there since the night we did surveillance. Metro tells us because of so many complaints, they've put additional resources towards these illegal tows.

If you've got a complaint about a tow company, you can also file with the Nevada Transportation Services Authority by calling 486-3303 or, you can submit a written complaint on line.

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