“Why are you driving my vehicle?” she asked her.
The stepdaughter said she was driving the car from Weymouth, but didn’t explain why. Then, when Morales eventually picked up the car, it turned out to have hundreds of extra miles on it. And, making matters worse, the mechanic allegedly didn’t even fix the vehicle properly, instead putting in a faulty transmission.
Morales eventually took her car to the dealer to get it fixed, but she’s still upset about it being driven without permission and about the repairs not being completed by the repair shop. And she has every reason to be, as lawyers say that the mechanic and his stepdaughter likely violated the law.
Mechanics don’t just have the right to drive your car whenever they want
Morales described herself as “flabbergasted” when she saw her vehicle being driven, and this isn’t an unusual reaction. No one drops off their vehicle at a repair shop and expects the mechanic or their kids to start driving it all over town.
“A repair shop doesn’t get free use of your car just because you left it with them,” Doug Burnetti, an auto law expert at Burnetti, P.A., told Moneywise. “Some driving may be necessary to diagnose or test a repair, but putting hundreds of miles on it without permission is a different story, and the owner could claim compensation for any damage, depreciation, fuel or other losses that resulted.”
Michael A, Klitzke, owner of Auto Law Firm, PC, agrees, telling Moneywise, “Just about any time you take a vehicle in for repair work, there’s going to be an express or implied agreement that the mechanic can do some amount of test driving to diagnose the problem and confirm the repair was successful. Very rarely is that going to be more than five miles and exceedingly rare for test driving to exceed 50 miles.”
Klitzke said the car’s owner could likely pursue legal action based on the stepdaughter’s joyride, as Morales potentially has “a legal claim for trespass, a bailment claim“ or a claim based on “theft, conversion or negligence.”
Ryan Sullivan, a criminal defense lawyer at Erkan & Sullivan, PC, casts doubt on the theft claim, as the dealer’s stepdaughter may not have met the elements of the offense (which often involve simultaneously taking something with intent to deprive the rightful owner of its use). However, Sullivan suggested a different crime, ”use without authority,” may apply.
Ultimately, the best legal arguments will depend on how long the car was used and what damage, if any, resulted. Consulting a lawyer to make an informed decision could be the best bet.
