Law Will Let Officials Seize Cars of Unlicensed Drivers : Safety: A vehicle can be impounded the first time a person is caught, and sold after the second time.

By LISA RESPERS

Dec. 29, 1994 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

Citing several recent traffic fatalities, officials reminded California motorists Wednesday that a new law becomes effective Sunday that allows authorities to seize and sell the automobile of anyone caught driving a second time without a valid driver’s license.

The new law allows law enforcement officers to confiscate an unlicensed driver’s vehicle and impound it for 30 days. The driver must obtain a valid license to retrieve the car or have another licensed driver take possession of it.

If the unlicensed driver is caught again, he or she must secure a valid driver’s license within three business days or the car will be sold. The proceeds will pay towing and impound expenses, with the remainder divided between local and state governments, authorities said.

At a news conference at Hollywood Tow, a law enforcement impound lot, Assemblyman Richard Katz (D-Sylmar) said the new penalty will be the toughest of its kind in the country and is aimed at preventing accidents and deaths.

“There are 1.7 million people in California who have no right to be on the road,” said Katz, who introduced the bill that led to the law.

Katz said 20% of drivers involved in fatal accidents were driving without valid licenses in 1990, the most recent year for which statistics were available.

Surrounded by law enforcement officers and by people whose loved ones have been killed by unlicensed drivers, Katz said that what sparked his desire to offer the bill was a television report that showed a news crew following a drunk driver who had driven away from court after having his license revoked.

Katz said the Department of Motor Vehicles estimates that 750,000 California drivers lose their licenses annually after being convicted of drunk driving and 75% continue to drive. Those drivers are four times more likely to be involved in accidents, he said.

Katz said Santa Rosa and Portland, Ore., have similar laws allowing authorities to impound the cars of unlicensed drivers and that both have been challenged in court and found to be constitutional.

Also at the news conference was Marcia Susser of West Los Angeles, who said the new law might have saved her 19-year-old son, London, who died in a 1991 accident in which he was a passenger in a car driven by someone with a suspended license.

Dressed in black and wearing a necklace and brooch containing pictures of her son, Susser spoke of the devastation she and her family have suffered since the accident.

“When you kill a person, you don’t just kill one person,” she said. “You kill their family and their whole network of friends.”

The driver of the car fled to his native Hungary rather than face prosecution, she said.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California opposes the law.

Allan Parachini, a spokesman for the ACLU of Southern California, said that the organization has no current plans to challenge the measure in court but will be “very intently watching how this law is put into effect.

“There are some built-in inadequacies in this bill,” Parachini said. “While the bill has been somewhat tempered during the last six months, it is still not a bill we can support.”

Parachini said his organization is concerned with the problems joint owners will have if one of them is unlicensed. He also said he fears that police could stop drivers for the sole purpose of seizing cars.

California Highway Patrol Chief Ed Gomez said that although police would rather not have to be in the business of impounding and selling cars, he feels the severity of the law is “indicative of the extent of the problem.

“What we are asking people to do is to not drive if they don’t have a license,” Gomez said. “Don’t perpetuate this hazardous cycle.”