A man has been left furious after his 'foolish generosity' left him with someone else's car in his driveway since December 2021.
Omar Badran says his kindness has backfired, after initially agreeing to let a stranger park their car in his driveway, report Plymouth Herald.
Now, over six months later, the car is still on his property in Stoke.
Omar said he originally allowed someone he didn’t know to use his driveway because he wasn’t using it himself as he does not drive.
But he is now struggling to get the car off of his property as according to him, the person who the car belongs to is refusing to collect it.
He adds that he got in touch to get the man to collect his car - but the man would not comply.
A furious Omar said: “I agreed on the condition that when I wanted to use my driveway again, I would be able to.”
Since this incident, Omar says he has explored legal avenues to get rid of the vehicle.
However, he was shocked to find it is legally considered a 'grey area', and he may have difficulty removing it.
He said: “I was shocked by my initial search, it’s legally a grey area and you might not be able to get the council, police or the DVLA to do anything about it, even though the vehicle is uninsured, isn’t taxed and has no MOT.
“I phoned up all these places and they said they couldn’t do anything.”
However, after several weeks of stress, Omar says he has found a solution under the Tort Law Act, saying: “I found that under the Torts Act there is a way to deal with it. It took me several weeks and lot of stress, I thought I was going to be stuck with a really bad situation that would involve thousands of pounds spent in a civil court.”
Omar has now added a sign, which has been placed against the windscreen of the car on his driveway. It reads: "Under the Torts Act, this vehicle will be disposed of in one week from 27/06/22 if the owner does not collect it.”
After discussion with several legal professionals, Omar has been further instructed that he should contact the owner of the vehicle in writing and allow for a reasonable time to pass before disposing of it.
Omar said: “I have been told by a solicitor that I should contact the person in writing. I have been told to fill in a V888 form which will allow me to have access to the person's address and then I can write to them and quote the Tort Law Act.
“There isn’t a specified time in the act but it just specifies that the time give for the individual to respond should be ‘reasonable,’ so I’ve decided to give him two weeks once I get the address from the DVLA.
"This entire thing has made be really miserable and so many people have told me I’m stupid for having allowed him to park on my driveway but I was just trying to do a nice thing.”
