N.Y. Vehicle & Traffic Law § 424: Stolen or impounded motor vehicles

§ 424. Stolen or impounded motor vehicles. 1. (a) Agencies which are

members of the New York statewide police information network shall

report any theft, recovery or impounding of a motor vehicle, trailer or

part or parts thereof to such network. Agencies which are not members of

the New York statewide police information network shall make such

reports through a member agency. Such reports shall if possible contain

at least the vehicle identification number, the date of theft, recovery

or impounding of the vehicle, the license plate number and where the

vehicle was stolen, recovered or impounded and the name, address and

telephone number of the facility where such vehicle has been stored.

Such information shall be made available to the commissioner of motor

vehicles. The commissioner may assist in providing information with

respect to stolen or recovered motor vehicles, trailers and parts as he

may deem advisable.

(b) For the purposes of this subdivision the term "impound" shall be

deemed to include the taking into possession by an agency of any motor

vehicle which has been abandoned, repossessed, seized pending forfeiture

proceedings, taken into custody or held as evidence in the course of a

police investigation, required to be impounded by law, or in any other

way taken into possession or held by an agency under circumstances in

which the owner may not reasonably have knowledge of the status of the

vehicle. Nothing contained herein shall preclude a police department,

which has taken a vehicle into custody under these or other

circumstances, from entering a vehicle into the New York statewide

police information network as an impounded vehicle to facilitate

location of the vehicle by its owner.

2. Any police officer, state trooper or peace officer acting pursuant

to his or her special duties shall have the power to seize any motor

vehicle or trailer in the state when there is good reason to believe

that such motor vehicle or trailer has been stolen. Unless the vehicle

is subject to the provisions of section four hundred twenty-three-a of

this article, the appropriate agency shall contact the owner of such

motor vehicle or trailer, if known, and, after any stolen vehicle alarm

resulting from such theft has been cancelled, release the vehicle to

such owner. If the owner thereof cannot be ascertained in accordance

with procedures established by regulations of the commissioner, a local

police agency shall dispose of such vehicle as an abandoned vehicle

pursuant to section twelve hundred twenty-four of this chapter, and the

state police shall hold such vehicle for, or deliver it to the office of

general services.