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Published Tuesday, February 16, 2021
Police seize more than 6,000 vehicles and plates
By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Traffic Police said to have seized 5,239 vehicle plates and 935 vehicles in January.
Not having paid the so-called Marchamo (a compound tax on the right to drive a specific vehicle), driving without a license or parking in a forbidden zone, are some of the causes for the confiscations, according to Traffic Police statistics.
Motorcycles lead the seizures with 797 cases, followed by the sedan-type car with 133 cases.
The owners will not only have to pay the fine to recover their vehicle but also they must pay a series of additional charges, such as towing plus the days it remained in custody in the warehouses of the Ministry of Transport.
As for license plate seizures, sedan-type cars lead with 2,778 cases, followed by 2,116 plates of motorcycles.
However, the 2021 number of vehicle and license plate seizures this year is lower than in January 2020 with 7,021.
Last week, police also reported an increase in car crash-related deaths, despite the ban-on-driving rule and the restrictions to the general commerce imposed by the government to try to avoid an increase in covid-19 infections.
According to the police, 36 people died in car crashes in January. This figure exceeds 8 deaths compared to January 2020, when 28 people died in road accidents when the ban-on-driving rule had not yet been established.
The statistics of the first month of 2021 shows that neither the ban-on-driving rule has been sufficient to reduce death linked to road accidents, the Ministry of Transport said in its statement.
Of the total deaths, 164 happened at night, between 6 p.m. to 6 a.m. of the next day, a time that almost entirely matches with the driving restriction schedule.Also, 65 people died in car crashes on a Saturday night according to the statistics.
One fact that concerns the authorities is that the majority of the 152 dead were young drivers, between the ages of 21 and 40 years old.
According to the ministry, traffic police officers are focused on patrolling the streets in speeding detection, drunk drivers detection, use of safety devices, among others.
In 2020, 300 deaths were caused by car crashes, according to the ministry statistics.
People can report any case of faults to the Traffic Law by dialing the 911 emergency line.
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What have you heard of expats experiencing trouble recovering license plates seized by the police? We would like to know your thoughts on this story. Send your comments to news@amcostarica.com
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