(A) Members of the Police Department are hereby authorized to remove a vehicle from a street or highway to the nearest garage or other place of safety, or to a garage designated or maintained by the city located in or within one mile of the city limits under the following circumstances:
(1) When any vehicle is left unattended upon any bridge or in any tunnel where the vehicle constitutes an obstruction to traffic.
(2) When a vehicle upon a highway is so disabled as to constitute an obstruction to traffic and the person or persons in charge of the vehicle are by reason of physical injury incapacitated to such an extent as to be unable to provide for its custody or removal.
(3) When any vehicle is left unattended upon a street and is so parked illegally as to constitute a definite hazard or obstruction to the normal movement of traffic, or is parked in violation of the night parking restrictions set forth in § 73.02.
(B) Whenever an officer removes a vehicle from a street as authorized in this section and the officer knows or is able to ascertain from the registration records in the vehicle the name and address of the owner thereof, the officer shall immediately give or cause to be given notice in writing to the owner of the fact of the removal and the reasons therefor and of the place to which the vehicle has been removed. In the event any such vehicle is stored in a public garage, a copy of the notice shall be given to the proprietor of the garage.
(C) The owner or operator of any such vehicle so towed in may regain possession thereof by paying in full to the owner or operator of the garage having possession of the vehicle the towage charges plus the storage charges incurred pursuant to this section.
(D) All towage charges and storage charges incurred as herein provided shall become a lien upon the vehicle in favor of the owner or operator of the garage in possession of the vehicle. The owner or operator of the garage as herein provided having a lien on any vehicle may after 60 days proceed to foreclose on the lien in the same manner as provided for the foreclosure of mechanics' liens.
('79 Code, § 8-29)
Statutory reference:
Foreclosure proceeding for mechanics' liens, see I.C. 32-33-9
Liens on motor vehicles for storage, see I.C. 32-33-10