Call Kurtis: A Case Of Mistaken Identity
A Rocklin man gets mailed a ticket for someone with a similar name.
When three government agencies sent him to the other to get it fixed, it was time to Call Kurtis.
It's not the first time we've seen this problem, but he says this ticket cost him a job!
He later got it dropped but says he can't unlink himself from this other guy.
"I'm scared honestly, I don't want to wait till he gets a felony and people are looking for me and that could very well happen," says Nathaniel Ricci.
A seatbelt violation from 2009 in Davis showed up on Nathaniel Ricci's driving record.
"I've never lived in Davis. I've never even traveled there," says Nathaniel.
The ticket shows a Nathaniel "Morris" Ricci got fined.
"I'm Nathaniel 'Ray' Ricci," says Nathaniel.
Yes Nathaniel's middle name is "Ray," not "Morris."
And his birth date is in March 1987, not December 1987.
He drives a Chevy TrailBlazer, not a Dodge Caravan, the vehicle driven when the ticket was written.
And he says it's cost him a job that required a clean driving history.
"I was really shocked," says Nathaniel.
After contacting the DMV, Woodland CHP and Yolo County courts by phone and in person, he got the ticket dropped.
But, he says his personal information is still linked to this other guy's driving record.
"Nobody can explain why," says Nathaniel.
We contacted Woodland CHP, which directed us to the DMV, which blamed the courts.
The Yolo County courts blamed the CHP's bad handwriting for this mess.
A copy of the ticket shows that indeed, it's hard to read the driver's license number and the birth date.
"They all point fingers at each other," says Beth Gaines (R), a Roseville Assemblywoman.
Gaines says you shouldn't have to jump through hoops to clear your name, when you did nothing wrong.
"I will be looking into this further and doing some research to see if there's something else we can do to hold state agencies like this accountable," says Gaines.
The DMV says it has classified Nathaniel's driving record as "controlled" so no one else's information ends up on his record.
Nathaniel hopes this fix sticks.
"I can finally move on and find some kind of peace and not worry what's going to happen the next day," says Nathaniel.
Gaines is looking into whether there can be a law that would streamline the process for consumers when multiple state agencies are involved.
In this case, her office was able to make calls and wrote a letter to the DMV on behalf of Nathaniel.
Read the statements from the DMV, Yolo courts and Assemblywoman Gaines.
