§ 10851(a) VC – Driving or Taking Vehicle Without Consent

California Vehicle Code § 10851 VC makes it a crime to take or drive someone else’s vehicle without their consent. Commonly called joyriding, this offense can be charged as either a misdemeanor or a felony:

10851(a) VC Penalties
Misdemeanor	Up to 1 year in county jail and/or 5,000 in fines.
Felony	16 months, 2 years, or 3 years in county jail and/or up to $10,000

In this article, our California criminal defense attorneys discuss the following joyriding topics:

• 1. Elements of 10851(a) VC
• 2. Defenses
• 3. Penalties
• 4. Related Offenses
• Additional Reading

1. Elements of 10851(a) VC

For you to be convicted of joyriding under Vehicle Code 10851(a) VC, the prosecutors must prove beyond a reasonable doubt these three elements of California Jury Instruction “CALCRIM” 1820:

1. You drove or took someone else’s vehicle;
2. The owner of the vehicle did not consent to the driving or taking; and,
3. You acted with the intent to deny the vehicle’s owner possession of the vehicle for any period of time.¹

Examples of joyriding include:

• Hotwiring a neighbor’s car in order to make it to the airport on time to catch a flight
• While house-sitting for a friend, “borrowing” the friend’s car (with no consent)
• Without permission to do so, taking a parent’s car out to go on a date

Take note that with regards to the third element, you can be found guilty of joyriding even if you intended to bring the car back. Merely “borrowing” a motor vehicle still violates 10851(a) VC.²

Also, the court will likely determine that you had “intent to deny” the owner possession of their vehicle if you are found in possession of the vehicle under suspicious circumstances.³

2. Defenses

Here at Shouse Law Group, we have represented literally thousands of people accused of vehicular crimes such as joyriding. In our experience, the following three defenses have proven very effective with prosecutors, judges, and juries at getting these charges reduced or dismissed.

1) You Had a Claim of Right to the Vehicle

In this particular context, a claim of right means that you rightfully owned the car that you drove or took. Therefore, you committed no crime if you owned the vehicle involved.

We typically raise this defense when it is unclear as to whose name a car’s title is under. As long as there is a reasonable doubt as to ownership, the joyriding charges should not stand.

2) The Owner Consented to You Driving the Vehicle

Recall that an element of the crime of joyriding is that a car’s owner must not have consented to you driving or taking the car. A solid defense, therefore, is for you to show that you had the vehicle owner’s consent to drive it.

Note that consent must be given for the specific facts of a given case. 10851(c) VC expressly states that consent cannot be presumed or implied because of the owner’s consent on a previous occasion.⁴

Therefore, we gather all the available evidence indicating the owner consented. Typically, such evidence includes text messages, voicemails, emails, eyewitness testimony, or surveillance footage.

3) You Acted Under Duress

To best understand this defense, think of a case where a bank robber holds a pedestrian at gunpoint and tells him to get into a running car and drive them away.

Therefore, duress is when an accused basically says, “He made me do it.” Duress applies to the very limited situation in which you commit a crime (here, unlawfully taking a car), because somebody threatened to kill you if the crime was not committed.

3. Penalties

Under Vehicle Code 10851(a) VC, unlawfully taking or driving a vehicle is a wobbler. This means it can be punished as either a California misdemeanor or a felony.

As a misdemeanor, joyriding carries up to one year in county jail and/or $5,000.⁵ As a felony, joyriding carries 16 months, two years, or three years in jail and/or up to $10,000.⁶

Note that the penalties increase if:

• You drove or took an ambulance, law enforcement vehicle, or fire department vehicle on an emergency call;⁷ or,
• You have one or more prior felony convictions of joyriding or grand theft.⁸

In these “aggravated” circumstances, joyriding carries two, three, or four years in jail and/or up to $10,000.⁹

When clients contact us following a joyriding arrest, we can often engage in a pre-file intervention in attempt to persuade prosecutors to bring misdemeanor instead of felony charges. In some cases, we even convince the state not to bring charges at all due to a lack of incriminating evidence.

4. Related Offenses

1. Grand theft auto – PC 487(d)(1) – Stealing a vehicle.
2. Auto burglary – PC 459 – Entering a locked vehicle with the intent to commit grand larceny, petit larceny, or any felony offense.
3. Malicious mischief to a vehicle – VC 10853 – Entering or climbing onto another person’s vehicle, or tampering with the controls, in order to cause damage.

Additional Reading

For more in-depth information, refer to the following scholarly articles:

• Injuries related to car crime: the joy-riding epidemic – Injury.
• Perceptions of Physical, Psychological, Social and Legal Deterrents to Joyriding – Crime Prevention and Community Safety.
• Investigation into Joyriding as an Addictive Behaviour – Loughborough University.
• Speeding and Joy Riding – Shades of Deviance: A Primer on Crime, Deviance and Social Harm.
• Addicted to joyriding? An exploration of young offenders’ accounts of their car crime – Psychology, Crime & Law.

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