Description
Local reporters at The Connecticut Mirror heard story after story of drivers having their cars towed and then sold out from underneath them, sometimes in just 15 days. They teamed up with ProPublica to investigate why, how often this was happening and who was profiting from it.

This episode traces the history of the 100-year-old law that made all of it legal and follows the reporters as they try to track down drivers’ cars and confront the bureaucrats allowing a flawed system to take advantage of vulnerable people.

Transcript
Editor’s Note: “Paper Trail” is produced as an audio series. If you are able, we encourage you to listen to the series. Transcripts are for reference only and may contain typos. Please confirm accuracy before quoting.

Getting your car towed is one of those life experiences that is so common and yet will completely ruin your day. That feeling of walking out to your car and it’s just gone. Vaporized. Whatever you wanted to do that day — it’s over. That’s sort of on the low end of the consequences.

But I want to take you to a place where for years, people have been having a funhouse mirror version of this experience. Where this annoying but pretty common thing becomes a life-altering experience.

And this place is called Connecticut.