(a) A person who knowingly buys, receives, disposes of, sells, offers for sale, conceals, transports, causes to be transported, or possesses a motor vehicle, or a motor or engine removed from a motor vehicle, from which the manufacturer's serial number, motor or engine number or other distinguishing number or identification mark has been removed, defaced, covered, altered or destroyed for the purpose of concealing or misrepresenting the identity of the motor vehicle or part thereof, is guilty of a felony.

Ask a traffic law question, get an answer ASAP!
Thousands of highly rated, verified traffic lawyers.
Parking violations, accidents, DUI/DWI, licensing, registration, and more
Protect your vehicle and your rights with expert legal help now
Click here to chat with a lawyer about your rights.

Terms Used In West Virginia Code 17A-8-7

  • Mobile equipment: means every self-propelled vehicle not designed or used primarily for the transportation of persons or property over the highway but which may infrequently or incidentally travel over the highways among job sites, equipment storage sites, or repair sites, including farm equipment, implements of husbandry, well drillers, cranes, and wood-sawing equipment. See West Virginia Code 17A-1-1
  • Motor vehicle: means every vehicle which is self-propelled and every vehicle which is propelled by electric power obtained from overhead trolley wires, but not operated upon rails. See West Virginia Code 17A-1-1
  • Person: means every natural person, firm, copartnership, association, or corporation. See West Virginia Code 17A-1-1
  • Special mobile equipment: means every self-propelled vehicle not designed or used primarily for the transportation of persons or property and incidentally operated or moved over the highways, including, without limitation, road construction or maintenance machinery, ditch-digging apparatus, stone crushers, air compressors, power shovels, graders, rollers, well drillers, wood-sawing equipment, asphalt spreaders, bituminous mixers, bucket loaders, ditchers, leveling graders, finishing machines, motor graders, road rollers, scarifiers, earth-moving carryalls, scrapers, drag lines, rock-drilling equipment, and earth-moving equipment. See West Virginia Code 17A-1-1

(b) A person who knowingly buys, receives, disposes of, sells, offers for sale, conceals, transports, causes to be transported, or possesses special mobile equipment or special mobile equipment tires from which the manufacturer's serial number, motor or engine number or other distinguishing number or identification mark has been removed, defaced, covered, altered or destroyed, is guilty of a felony.