Executive Summary: Key Legal and Evidentiary Issues

• Reliable Towing's sale of the impounded RV failed to comply with the statutory notice and public auction requirements under the Warehouse Lien Act (WLA).

• Notice of the intended sale was sent to a Saskatchewan address despite Reliable Towing knowing the registered owner, Mr. Last, resided in Vancouver and had provided his local contact details.

• The WLA notice omitted the time and place of the public auction, a significant procedural deficiency that deprived Mr. Last of the opportunity to attend or settle his account beforehand.

• A private sale to Mr. Brennan — a long-time friend of Reliable Towing's manager — was conducted after a public auction attracted no bidders, undermining the arm's-length competition the WLA requires.

• Tort claims for conversion, conspiracy, and fraudulent misrepresentation were found unsuitable for summary trial and were deferred to a conventional trial requiring viva voce evidence.

• On the question of costs, the court determined that success was mixed across the applications and ordered each party to bear its own costs rather than following the usual "costs follow the event" rule.

The purchase and abandonment of the RV

Geoffrey Last, operating through Last Motorcar Co., was in the business of buying and selling vehicles for clients. In April 2024, a client named Mr. Jamieson retained Mr. Last to purchase a recreational vehicle he could use for extended travel in the United States and Mexico. Mr. Last located a 2014 Tiffin Allegro RV in Weyburn, Saskatchewan, and purchased it on June 11, 2024, for $225,000 in his own name on Mr. Jamieson's behalf. He registered the RV in Saskatchewan using his mother's Saskatoon address, then returned to Vancouver with two sets of keys, which he gave to Mr. Jamieson. Mr. Jamieson subsequently travelled to Saskatchewan, picked up the RV, and drove it to the Lower Mainland, damaging the passenger side en route. When Mr. Last attempted to transfer ownership in early July 2024, Mr. Jamieson refused to take possession and abandoned the RV on the side of a road in Chilliwack. Mr. Last did not recover the keys.

Impoundment and early communications with Reliable Towing

A City of Chilliwack by-law officer instructed the defendant, Reliable Towing Mission Ltd., to tow the abandoned RV. Reliable Towing moved the vehicle first to its lot in Agassiz and then to its lot in Mission. Approximately four days after the RV arrived at the Mission lot, Mr. Last telephoned Jace Summers, a Reliable Towing employee, and explained the circumstances of the purchase and abandonment. On July 9, 2024, Mr. Last attended Reliable Towing's Chilliwack office, provided his name, telephone number, and email address, and informed Mr. Summers that he lived in Vancouver. Mr. Summers advised Mr. Last of the accrued storage charges and told him that the RV could be released upon payment. However, because Mr. Last did not have keys to the RV, he was unable to take practical steps to retrieve it at that time.

Fire damage and the flawed notice process

On October 14, 2024, a vehicle stored next to the RV on Reliable Towing's impound lot caught fire, causing damage to the passenger side of the RV. Reliable Towing did not report the fire to its insurer or make any claim for compensation. On January 17, 2025, Reliable Towing contacted Saskatchewan Government Insurance (SGI) to identify the registered owner. SGI provided Mr. Last's name with the Saskatoon address, but also supplied the business address of Last Motorcar Co. on West Pender in Vancouver, along with two telephone numbers and an email address. Despite possessing these Vancouver contact details, Reliable Towing sent its WLA notice of intention to sell — dated January 17, 2025 and claiming $34,210 in outstanding storage charges — exclusively to the Saskatoon address, where Mr. Last's mother no longer resided. Critically, the notice omitted the time and place of the intended public auction.

Breakdown in communications and the contested sale

Mr. Last learned of the registered letter through his brother in February 2025 and immediately emailed Reliable Towing on February 7, 2025, expressing his intent to settle the account and explaining that health issues had delayed his response. He also noted that he had previously left his Vancouver contact information at the Chilliwack office. His email went unanswered, and further attempts to reach Reliable Towing were unsuccessful. After Mr. Summers, who had since left the company, helped put Mr. Last in touch with Dave Rahberger, Reliable Towing's manager, several telephone and text conversations took place between March and May 2025. Mr. Last expressed his intent to visit the lot, confirmed he lacked keys, and ordered new ones from the RV manufacturer in Alabama. He also visited the Mission lot on May 26, 2025, to inspect the RV. On that same day, Mr. Rahberger informed Mr. Last by phone that a bid had been received and advised that Reliable Towing would sell the RV by the end of the week if the charges — which he quoted orally at close to $60,000 — were not paid. No written account was provided, and there was no evidence that Mr. Last was ever told a public auction had been advertised for March 14, 2025 (at which no bids had been received). On June 2, 2025, Reliable Towing sold the RV for $40,000 to Liam Brennan, a long-time friend of Mr. Rahberger, who registered it to 0696787 B.C. Ltd. and began repairs with his business partner, Brad Letkeman.

The statutory framework and key deficiencies

The court examined the relevant provisions of the Motor Vehicle Act and the Warehouse Lien Act. Section 188 of the Motor Vehicle Act authorizes the towing of abandoned vehicles and creates a lien in favour of the storage keeper, enforceable through the WLA. Section 4 of the WLA prescribes a detailed process for enforcing such a lien by sale, including requirements that the notice to the owner contain a description of the goods, an itemized statement of charges, a demand for payment within at least 21 days, and a statement that the goods will be sold by public auction at a specified time and place. Section 8 requires notice to be sent by registered letter to the person's last known address. Section 5 grants the court discretion to uphold a sale on the basis of "substantial compliance" or to decline to void it where doing so would be inequitable. The court concluded that section 3 of the WLA — which deals with goods deposited by a person entrusted by the owner — did not apply here because Mr. Last had not entrusted the City of Chilliwack with the RV; the city acted under its own statutory authority after Mr. Jamieson abandoned the vehicle.

The court's findings on the validity of the sale

Justice Hoffman identified three significant respects in which the WLA notice and sale process failed to comply with statutory requirements. First, the notice omitted any time and place for the public auction, depriving Mr. Last of the ability to attend or to settle his account before a sale date. Second, the notice was sent to the Saskatchewan address despite Reliable Towing's knowledge — from both Mr. Last's in-person visit and SGI's records — that Mr. Last's last known address was in Vancouver. Third, the sale to Mr. Brennan was not a public auction but a private transaction between friends; the text messages between Mr. Rahberger and Mr. Brennan demonstrated that Mr. Rahberger was motivated to sell the RV to Mr. Brennan and did only the bare minimum to notify Mr. Last. The court also rejected the argument of substantial compliance, noting that the ongoing communications between Mr. Last and Mr. Rahberger in April and May 2025 would have reasonably given Mr. Last the impression that the RV was not in imminent danger of being sold. The court further found it was not inequitable to void the sale, in part because Mr. Brennan was familiar with WLA sale procedures, knew the risks of non-compliance, and had been provided Mr. Last's contact information before the purchase.

Validity of the lien and deferral of tort claims

While the sale was declared void, the court held that Reliable Towing's underlying lien for towing and storage charges remained valid, subject to Mr. Last's claim for fire damages to be adjudicated at trial. The tort claims — conversion, conspiracy, and fraudulent misrepresentation — were found unsuitable for summary determination because they required findings about the defendants' knowledge and intent that could only be made after viva voce testimony.

Transfer of possession and the costs decision

Under Rule 10-1(4), the court ordered the RV transferred to Mr. Last's possession, finding that his right of ownership was superior to the maintenance of the lien, provided appropriate security was posted. Mr. Last was required to post $30,000 in security — between the $15,000 he proposed and the full lien amount sought by Reliable Towing — and to provide an undertaking to pay any damages that might ultimately be found owing to the defendants. Reliable Towing was ordered to return $40,000 to Mr. Brennan and to bear the costs of transporting the RV to a dealership chosen by the plaintiffs. In a subsequent costs decision dated March 16, 2026 (2026 BCSC 446), Justice Hoffman concluded that success on the applications was mixed: while Mr. Last succeeded in voiding the sale and obtaining possession, the lien was upheld, the tort claims were deferred, and the security amount was set higher than what Mr. Last had sought. The court exercised its discretion to depart from the usual rule that costs follow the event and ordered each party to bear its own costs. No specific monetary award of damages was determined at this stage, as the remaining tort claims, the fire-damage liability issue, and the Brennan defendants' counterclaim for unjust enrichment (totalling $97,400 in claimed expenditures) were all reserved for the trial scheduled for April 2026.