Could this happen to YOUR hot rod?
 

...in America?

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/...-in-epa-emiss/

Re: Could this happen to YOUR hot rod?
 

Calm down, there are some importers that are importing european vehicles that have swapped VINs claiming they are older than they are. 20 year old vehicles are exempt from Federal emission and DOT standards. They take a newer Land Rover and re VIN and title it as a 20 year old model. This is really popular with Land Rovers and the classic Mini. Ive seen plenty of Minis which I know are late 90s and later model years being represented as much earlier models.

Re: Could this happen to YOUR hot rod?
 

So?
The couple didn't steal the vehicle.Justifies a commando raid by DHS? That's their job now ,when the border is wide open and illegals can fly on airplanes with NO ID?
You calm down when they come on your property when you haven't intentionally broken any laws.

Re: Could this happen to YOUR hot rod?
 

First it a federal and state crime to alter a VIN on car. And anyone who has a late model car and he title says a much older car can not claim ignorance, And do you really want to live in country we have to show papers?

Re: Could this happen to YOUR hot rod?
 

Do you guys actually think this couple knew they were buying an altered VIN vehicle? Do they seem like the type to get involved with that intentionally?
Not saying they didn't get caught up in illegal activity.
I'm talking about the heavy handed tactics used against them...
Cowboys!

Re: Could this happen to YOUR hot rod?
 

Got any proof that any of that applies to the vehicle in question, and the people who own it?

Further, what the Hell is the Department of Homeland Security doing confiscating vehicles for emissions violations? Or even VIN violations for that matter?

There is a Marine imprisoned in Mexico for making a wrong turn. There are thousands of illegal aliens waltzing across our border with Mexico in droves, daily. There are Mexican drug cartels shooting at Border Patrol agents with high powered rifles and automatic weapons. There are federal agencies smuggling illegal aliens into U.S. cities and dumping them. The mayor of Chicago is asking the same federal agencies to bring him more illegal aliens so he can get more funds from the federal government. And while all of that is going on, the Department of Homeland Security is in South Carolina confiscating a Land Rover that might be a gray market vehicle, at the behest of the EPA.

And you're defending the actions of the EPA and the Department of Homeland Security?

If you DO NOT want to live in a country where you have to show your papers, I can assure you that you're going about that in the wrong way.

Re: Could this happen to YOUR hot rod?
 

Do the COPO Camaros and Cobra Jet Mustangs come with VINs?

Is it important for a race car?

Re: Could this happen to YOUR hot rod?
 

If we keep allowing the federal government to grow and gain power, you'll be lucky to have a race car of any kind, fuel for it, or a place to race it.

Re: Could this happen to YOUR hot rod?
 

Yes, I support the police and the law, you do not? Are you an anarchist?

If you DO NOT want to live in a country where you have to show your papers, I can assure you that you're going about that in the wrong way.[/quote]

The EPA does not have officers to make arrests. So yes the DHS or Justice would be their office to make the arrest.

Trying to bring the as you say aliens is just trying to blur the picture.

These people broke the law plain and simple. The car was illegally modified. In the people did not know that it just not change the fact .Your paranoid rantings will not change that fact.

In which way I am going wrong about not having to show papers, that was a question or statement without any validity.

Re: Could this happen to YOUR hot rod?
 

You obviously neither know nor support the law.

Exactly how was this vehicle modified? Do you know? For a fact? Do you even know the supposed reason the vehicle was confiscated? Or are you just taking it for granted that the government would never do anything questionable?

"As I say aliens"? If they are not illegal aliens, then exactly what are they? The law says they are illegal aliens. Dozens of laws, federal, state, and local clearly establish the definition of both "alien" and "illegal alien", laws tested and found to be perfectly in line with the Constitution, the supreme law of the land.

And you have no proof at all that the people who own the Land Rover broke the law. The truth is, if you read, the EPA and the Department of Homeland Security did in fact not only break the law, but also violated the Constitution. The warrant was completely illegal, as it did not have the name of the current owners on it. As such, no agency in the United States has the authority to go on to private property and serve the warrant. As I have served a warrant or two, the law clearly requires that every single piece of information on a warrant be absolutely correct, down to the letter. The names, address, and everything else on the warrant are required to be correct, to the letter. The name of the owner was in fact incorrect, it was the name of the 4th previous owner. The person named on the warrant was not the owner of the vehicle, nor the owner of the property the vehicle was parked on.

Further, the Department of Homeland Security is not charged with enforcing emissions laws, and it is even a stretch to say that they are charged with enforcing importation laws, especially not those that govern good such as motor vehicles.

Finally, the EPA does have its own enforcement section, and in fact, it has been recently stated that, along with the Internal Revenue Service, the EPA recently of all things purchased riot style shotguns, body armor, high capacity semi automatic handguns, and AR platform carbines.

Also, note that no one was arrested. A vehicle was confiscated.

Know the laws that govern your government and its agencies, and demand that those agencies adhere to those laws, lest those agencies trample your rights. Or, as was once stated a couple of hundred years ago:

The Constitution is not an instrument for the government to restrain the people, it is an instrument for the people to restrain the government - lest it come to dominate our lives and interests. --Patrick Henry

Re: Could this happen to YOUR hot rod?
 

Here is a little more logic for you, which I'm certain you're not prepared to deal with.

Your assertion, baseless though it is, is that the owners illegally modified the vehicle in question.

Well, according to the law, if you modify a vehicle by removing, or rendering inoperative, emissions equipment, which the EPA governs, the government can declare the vehicle illegal to operate on public roads. The law does not give them the option to confiscate the vehicle. It gives them the ability to say it is illegal to operate on public roads.

If you assert that the owners of the vehicle in question, and the EPA is therefore entitled to confiscate said privately owned vehicle, then you assert that they can come and take any race car that is built from a vehicle manufactured after about 1965. After all, such cars have certainly been modified by removing or rendering inoperative emissions control equipment.

Of course, I'm sure you will dismiss that obvious and well supported logic as "paranoid rantings", which, by the way, is a really nice personal attack on your part, which shows you are obviously incapable of actually debating the subject on facts, which is of course, no surprise.

Re: Could this happen to YOUR hot rod?
 

Alan you mad a lot of accusations and claims to fact that were not in that article, would you direct me to another news story that states these facts. And trying to join the other story is Non sequitur.

Nd yes the government both state, local and federal does have the right to take a vehicle, also if the VIN has been altered they have that right to.

And it does not matter who modified the vehicle, the owner, the past owners or a third party. It is still a unlawful modification.

And your assertion, again is wrong, the law states very clearly that any car made before 1975 can be modified, even in california.

Re: Could this happen to YOUR hot rod?
 

Friends, this important discussion is about to become political in nature. It can't be avoided now that we at least one of the community agitators involved.
If you are following it and you no longer see it here, there's a good chance it is in the restricted " political" section.
If you are not a member of it, you won't even see that section at the bottom of your screen.
There's lots of good information there that you probably won't hear from Wolf Blitzer.
All you have to do to participate is PM Kenny Meile , and ask to be added in.That's all there is to it.
See you on the other side.

Re: Could this happen to YOUR hot rod?
 

The government is not allowed to confiscate a vehicle for emissions modifications. They are allowed to deny the vehicle access to public roads. Period.

If the VIN has been altered, neither the EPA nor the Department of Homeland Security have any standing. The VIN being altered is strictly a matter for local law enforcement.

Even if the vehicle in question is a "gray market" vehicle, meaning it is a vehicle that is not approved for importation to the U.S., that is not the jurisdiction of either the EPA, or the Department of Homeland Security. As such, even if the VIN was altered to avoid those restrictions, it is not within the jurisdiction of the EPA nor the Department of Homeland security.

I direct you to the case of Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft, (as well as Paul Allen and Jerry Seinfeld) and the Porsche 959 he attempted to import into the U.S., which was not certified. It was the D.O.T. and NHTSA that prevented it from being driven, or even imported legally, and it was those two agencies that impounded the car at the import warehouse. Note, they impounded it at the import warehouse, they did not take it from its legal owner, nor deny him access to it, or nor deny him knowledge of its whereabouts.

Only ten years later did EPA certification become a sticking point, and the EPA did not confiscate the car.

Further, uncertified vehicles are allowed to be privately owned and driven for 2500 miles per year or less, and if they are more than 21 years old, the EPA no longer requires they meet emissions standards.

Interestingly enough, the Land Rover in question is a 1985 model, and as such, nearly 30 model years old. As such, the EPA, by its own regulations, no longer holds jurisdiction over the vehicle, under the EPA's own 21 year rule. And even if the vehicle is not a 1985 model, even if it is a 1995, the EPA does not have cause to confiscate it, they can only refuse to allow it access to public roads.

Of course, I suppose the 40 people who had their vehicles confiscated, and were denied even knowledge of their whereabouts (which is by the way illegal as well, the government cannot take your property without due process, and deny you knowledge of its disposition without the case going to court), are not allowed equal protection because they don't have the money that Bill Gates, Paul Allen, and Jerry Seinfeld do. Of course, that in itself is in violation of the equal protection clause of the Constitution.

Re: Could this happen to YOUR hot rod?
 

Wrong again Alan, the feds do have the right to take car in the VIN has been changed.

Penal Law § 170.70 states that
"A person is guilty of illegal possession of a vehicle identification number when * * *
"(2) He knowingly possesses a vehicle or vehicle part to which is attached a vehicle identification number plate or on which is stamped or embossed a vehicle identification number which has been destroyed, covered, defaced, altered or otherwise changed, or a vehicle or vehicle part from which a vehicle identification number plate has been removed".

And again you are wrong on the 21 year claim, that has been shot down so many times.

Re: Could this happen to YOUR hot rod?
 

I'll bail on this one Mark. I've made my point. At least two federal agencies not only over stepped their bounds, but also used absurd tactics in doing so, and also violated several parts of the Constitution. Regardless of the party in control, the federal government has long since far exceeded it's original limits and intent.

Re: Could this happen to YOUR hot rod?
 

I think we missed one point that scares me. It is obvious that homeland security, which really has no real mission, is expanding it's tentacles into places it was never meant to be.
How long will it be before they have their fingers in everybody's pies; state, local and federal?
My prediction is that like the Gestapo they will be deeply in everyone's day to day life in the future.

JimR

Re: Could this happen to YOUR hot rod?
 

Jim, I was just going to make this same point.
I'll bet,somewhere attached to some obscure bill somewhere snuck through without fanfare, is a clause that allows DHS to do any g** damn think they want to.
And remember who brought this to you, boys

Re: Could this happen to YOUR hot rod?
 

LIKE :] for Alan

Re: Could this happen to YOUR hot rod?
 

Jim, I did not miss that point at all.

The original intent of Homeland Security was merely to create a "clearing house" where the various agencies could access information gathered by other agencies. There are two problems that prevent this. The single biggest is petty inter-agency rivalries. But the second is which information, collected by what method, are the various agencies allowed to have and share.

The various agencies tasked with gathering and sifting through foreign intelligence information are strictly prohibited from gathering information inside the U.S. and their territories, and rightly so. However, some information gathered inside the U.S. is actually applicable to foreign information gathering, and can be shared with those agencies, and it should be.

Homeland Security was supposed to be tasked with taking information that agencies that operate legally inside the U.S. gathered and sharing what was legal to share with agencies such as the CIA, and sharing with other agencies what the CIA and agencies of its type gathered. Homeland Security was supposed to prevent things from slipping through the cracks or being withheld. For example, the FAA had questions about the terrorists who hijacked the planes on 11 September 2001. They were very suspicious of those individuals. Had this information, and other information, been shared with the correct agencies, the whole thing might well have been averted. The CIA and other agencies like it had information on those terrorists. So did the FBI, but the information was not shared, even in instances where it was perfectly legal and acceptable, either due to rivalries, or due to the lack of the knowledge that it could be shared.

Homeland Security was not originally intended to be "the enforcement section" of any federal agency, foreign or domestic. Just like the EPA and the IRS were never intended to have units equipped with various weapons and body armor. But now every agency wants to have its very own "tactical unit", populated with "men in black", wearing body armor and carrying weapons for the intent of intimidation at best, and of armed confrontations at worst.