[DeTomaso] Odd ebay listings

[Bill Lewis]

Along this same line of thought, if a person wanted to bring an illegal car into America, and actually drive it - couldn't they just either jack with the title somehow, or switch a legal license plate onto it and drive away into the sunset!    ---BILL Lewis

> From: mbefthomas at comcast.net
> To: MikeLDrew at aol.com; panteraplace at hotmail.com
> Date: Sat, 15 Jun 2013 08:33:59 -0700
> CC: detomaso at poca.com
> Subject: Re: [DeTomaso] Odd ebay listings
> 
> Mike, I appreciated very much your explanation below, and think that would
> be a good thing to reprint in Profiles or the newsletter in the near future.
> This is also something we might think about weaving into the upgrades being
> considered to the POCA website.
> 
> Mike Thomas
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: detomaso-bounces at poca.com [mailto:detomaso-bounces at poca.com] On Behalf
> Of MikeLDrew at aol.com
> Sent: Friday, June 14, 2013 9:36 PM
> To: panteraplace at hotmail.com
> Cc: detomaso at poca.com
> Subject: Re: [DeTomaso] Odd ebay listings
> 
> 
> In a message dated 6/14/13 18 14 9, panteraplace at hotmail.com writes:
> 
> 
> > Could be and probably another good reason for not publishing full VINs 
> > on the web.  I've been told that someone tried to publish my VIN on a 
> > website, but they have the number wrong so I guess it does not matter.
> > 
> 
> >>>Not yet, anyway.   At least, not to you.
> 
> However, I think it's important to point out that you're displaying what I 
> consider to be spectacularly faulty reasoning.
> 
> My VIN is THPNMD03960.   It's important to me that this is public 
> information.
> 
> Why?
> 
> Well, by way of contrast, consider several scenarious surrounding your 
> "I've got a secret" philosophy about your car's identity.
> 
> Let's say that somebody plucks some Pantera photos off the web, or from a 
> car show, then attempts to market the car somehow and assigns it your VIN.
> 
> Prospective buyers would hopefully conduct due diligence, and look for that 
> VIN in the registry to try to learn more about the car.   Failing to find 
> any information, they are left to proceed on good faith.   An unsuspecting 
> buyer can be seduced by a well-written ad, money changes hands, then the 
> perpetrator disappears into thin air, leaving the poor would-be buyer
> holding the 
> bag, with nothing to show for his expenditure.
> 
> Granted, this doesn't affect you personally--it's somebody else's problem.  
>  But you could have prevented it and chose not to.
> 
> Now, consider a more powerful scenario.   You come home from work one day 
> and find your garage door open, and your Pantera is gone.  Thieves have 
> spirited it away and it crosses the country.   Through various shenanigans, 
> dubious paperwork is generated which gives them the appearance of legitimate
> 
> ownership of the car, and the thieves then offer it up for sale.   A
> prospective 
> buyer, once again, does his due diligence, and finds no information in the 
> registry, and presented with a real car and matching paperwork, money trades
> 
> hands and the car is now in the hands of a new owner.
> 
> The car could then trade hands, legally, several times, and many years 
> could go by before it's discovered that the car was stolen.   You, of
> course, 
> would have no recourse because your insurance company paid the claim the 
> moment you reported the car stolen to them, and thus they technically became
> the 
> legal owners.   Their lawyers can go after the car and attempt to seize it, 
> and eventually they would prevail, but in the meantime, there would be years
> 
> of legal wrangling between the various parties, with claims and 
> counter-claims.   You would also have a very difficult time, as you would
> have to 
> engage lawyers to go after your insurance company if you wanted to retrieve
> the 
> car and return their payment to you, and there is no reason to believe you 
> would be successful in that endeavor.
> 
> (Note that this actually happened with a non-Pantera not too long ago; lots 
> of lawsuits resulted but the car was returned to the person who lost it 40+ 
> years ago, only because the car wasn't insured so there was no insurance 
> company to claim it).
> 
> In this instance, having your car fully documented in the registry would 
> have made it virtually un-steal-able.   Well, thieves could still take it,
> but 
> it would be much, much more difficult for them to sell it, because there 
> would be plenty of information contrary to their story available to the
> public 
> (and also, presumably, because you would have updated your registry entry 
> to highlight the fact that your car had been stolen).
> 
> The Shelby guys figured this out many, many years ago.   It is virtually 
> impossible to get away with stealing and then selling a Shelby, because
> their 
> registry is so air-tight.   The overwhelming majority of classic Shelbys 
> (probably 98% or more) are fully documented in the registry, so it's a
> simple 
> matter to pick up the book (they are very old-school still) and verify the 
> story behind a given car.   Too, the club does an excellent job of policing 
> the marketplace, and whenever a potentially fraudulent car comes to light, 
> they issue a very public warning about it (much as we try to do here, albeit
> on 
> a much more haphazard basis).
> 
> So, you can keep your car's identity a secret if you wish, but don't think 
> that you are doing yourself, or anybody else, any favors by doing so....
> 
> Mike
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