Quote:
Originally Posted by sunman
Paul started saying he owned the car last weekend of July. Nobody said otherwise. Bank shows note paid off shortly after. I believe Paul’s cash paid the note.
After accident #37 goes to SAI because no way it goes to Paul’s house to be a tragic reminder of what happened sitting in the driveway.
If Paul owned the car Curry the lawyer would have to file in probate for legal title.
He probably did. Then sold it in the lien auction to Ann.
If Paul owned CSX2049 and Curry didn’t use probate its still Paul’s car.
Or his heirs.
Can you check probate records? Everything Paul legally owned would be listed.
He was kinda young to have will.
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More speculation follows:
Interesting as Michael said that his mom was unconsolable. Would she really want to see the car in her driveway or garage again to remind her of what happened? Michael said that Shelby never contacted his family about the lien. Michael was 19, so I might assume that during the day he might of had a job or went to college, so is it possible that Michael is not around the house at times that people from Shelby called Paul's mom or when she received letters from Shelby about the car? Maybe Michael's mom was incapable of talking on the phone about the car or discarded the letters about the car because she was so distraught of the idea of getting the car back that she could not respond. Is it possible that she could not even talk to her children about the people at Shelby who are bugging her about taking back the car?
Michael, you say that your mom moved back to Illinois after several months. Is it possible that she moved prior to April 1964? If so, that would have made it harder for the Shelby people to contact her.
In any case I would think that any investigation into the car by Shelby would be a day or two effort, certainly not needing to hold onto the car for several months. Perhaps the investigation was just taking some pictures and sending them to AC or Ford. Or maybe getting someone like Phil Remington to look over the wreck? I don't see why your family would expect Shelby to hold on to the wreck from November through April. It seems like if your family wanted the wreck back they should have been asking for it back less than a week after it got to the shop.
You also say that a Shelby employee who knew your family brought you what turned out to be not your car's remnants, so even if the Shelby people had somehow lost the contact information for your family when the wreck arrived and somehow also lost the invoices for recent competition improvements on the car with Paul's contact information, there is at least that employee who knew your family who could help with your family's contact information when the company controller keeps on complaining for months about the apparently abandoned wreck taking up shop space.
Any reasonable business that has a car come into their shop knows who the car belongs to and how to contact them. So I don't understand how Shelby American could fail to contact your mom about the car. More likely an unconsolable widow just never wanted to see the car again regardless of whether her children wanted the wreck back.
I guess another interesting point has to do with probate and settling of the estate. If the car was jointly owned by Paul and his widow, wouldn't the wreck's ownership have automatically gone to the widow as opposed needing to be settled as part of the estate? And in theory if the widow now owning the wreck, abandoned the wreck at the Shelby shop, could Shelby dispose of the wreck with a mechanics lien without it involving probate?