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Unknowingly bought a stolen car

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Junior Member
What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? GA
My daughter & fiancee bought a car (paid approx. $14,000 cash) in GA from a fly by night car lot in June. After going through 2 temp paper tags, daughter got pulled over this week for expired (temp) tag. She had the appropriate insurance and after running VIN and insurance check, the officer issued a warning only for tag infraction. Daughter then attempted unsuccessfully to contact the car lot but got no answer and their vm was full, etc. Further investigation ultimately revealed that the car had just recently been reported stolen from an auction in PA. Meanwhile the GA car dealers (thieves) packed up and left GA.

Prior to purchasing the car, daughter checked CARFAX etc. and found nothing of interest. We guess that the thieves probably purchased the car from the auction with a bad check then set up shop in GA, and the auction business owner and/or bureaucratic red tape delayed the VIN showing up as stolen in the national database until later this week.

Please give any plausible solutions as to how to proceed with this mess. Thanks!
 


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Junior Member
Outcome

All ended well today. Daughter's fiancee tracked auction rep person down and met with him last week at the local auction company's office to discuss the situation and request the title of the car, which he purchased. Fiancee presented copy of the bill of sale to the auction rep as proof of purchase, etc. Meanwhile, fiancee also s/w the local TV station consumer rip off reporter regarding this situation, who wanted to interview fiancee for a story on the local nightly news. Apparently there were 4 other local people who bought vehicles from this same now defunct car dealership which ultimately defaulted on their payment to the auction company for those vehicles which they sold. The local auction company rep advised fiancee that he was in posession of the car title but needed to s/w his atty first. He told fiancee to come back next week (today) as he would likely be able to sign the title over at that time.

Fiancee went back to the auction guy today and received the title.
 

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