The Car Saga Continues

We received some bad news today regarding our car's theft in June. In order to clear the court case and be able to drive the car, we had to have someone put a $5000 deposit in the court's bank account. As I suspected, the court has their ways to prevent you from retrieving that money. The bond that was signed said that the money would be given back after one month's time. Well we waited two months and on Saturday started trying to get it back.

Our landlord's son spent 10 hours on Saturday and 8 more hours on Monday going back and forth between the court and the police station. It takes about an hour and a half to drive between them. When it all came down to it today, the court refused to give the $5000 back. They said that it was a "known" rule that we were not allowed to transfer the ownership of the car for two entire years after it was stolen and recovered. We did transfer the name from our friend's name to our landlord's name, as our friend plans to immigrate to another country and was not available to handle the court case. This "known rule" about not selling the car or transferring ownership was not written on the surety bond. It was told to us AFTER we tried to get the money back.

Now we have something quite bad, a letter which tells us that the penalty for transferring the car's registered owner is $5000. Yes, five thousand dollars as a penalty! Then it also says that we can not sell the car or transfer the ownership for two years. If we do, they can take legal action against my landlord.

This is how I feel right now: Pakistan's justice system is sold out.

The whole system is a harlot, a brazen prostitute.
She laughs in the face of justice,
a slave to her masters desires.

You step gingerly into her chambers,
where she lounges on exquisite velvet cushions.
Her long, black hair dances flirtatiously over her shoulders.
As you take your seat,
she knows why you have come.

"Justice? Ha! Law?"
she reclines and bats her furled eyelashes.

Read the entire poem here