I’m probably one of the least judgmental people you’ll ever come across! I know that people make bad choices and mistakes and that sometimes the things they do can get them into trouble. What’s most important is that when someone makes a choice or mistake that gets them into trouble is that they learn from it, change their lives and do their best to not repeat their mistakes!

We recently had a very good friend who made a bad choice and got behind the wheel of his vehicle after having too much to drink. Fortunately, no one was hurt when he made this choice! He was stopped by the police and charged with a DUI. The night that he was stopped and arrested, his vehicle was impounded and he was told that he’d have to wait until after his first court appearance to ask the judge if he could remove his personal items from his vehicle, which included his work tools. Without these tools, he was totally unable to work, thus causing him loss of income.

His first court appearance was yesterday morning, and I was the person that was going to drive him there. As expected, he was worried about what was going to happen. The judge he was going before has a reputation of being hard ball. But our friend knew the decision he made was a bad one, and is making the steps on his own to make the changes in his life so that he doesn’t repeat this mistake.

Thankfully, the judge seemed to be in an abnormally decent mood yesterday and when my friend was called to go before him he explained about the tools and other property in his vehicle that were necessary for him to earn a living. While my friend was not allowed to get his vehicle out of impound, he was allowed to go to the impound lot and remove ALL of his personal property from his vehicle. Although that was a wonderful thing, it turned out not so wonderful.

It was immediately obvious that his vehicle had been gone through. Although he’s not the neatest person in the world, he’s very impeccable when it comes to his work tools being in order. As soon as we looked into his windows, it was obvious that his tools had been dumped and gone through. After opening the door and trying to get some sort of order to the mess, it was obvious that several of his most important tools were now missing.

Yes, he was 100% in the wrong for drinking and driving, he knows that. Yes, the law had the legal right to have his vehicle impounded for doing this! But how in the heck is it acceptable for these companies that impound peoples vehicles to STEAL peoples personal property when they take control of these vehicles? It’s a commonly known fact in this area that this happens ALL the time! It’s bad enough that peoples lives are put into turmoil because of the very bad decisions they make that cause them legal repercussions, but something needs to be done about the towing companies that think it’s their “right” to STEAL peoples personal property when impounding someones vehicles! THAT’S JUST WRONG!