Custom NY plate "Blank" results in $40k of fines

Carole Blank Brown, a 70-year-old New York lawyer and real estate title agent, discovered that her personalized license plate had apparently turned an administrative placeholder into a costly mistake. After updating her car registration, she received notices for two parking violations she said her BMW had not committed. A call to 311 revealed more than 400 unpaid summonses, with fines and late charges exceeding $40,000. The tickets covered violations including double parking, blocking hydrants and missing plates. Their license-plate fields were empty: the word “blank” on the forms had seemingly been treated as her plate number, “BLANK,” which she had chosen as a nod to her maiden name.

Brown challenged the summonses, but clearing them required repeated trips to city offices and hearings where judges reviewed tickets individually. She estimates she made at least 10 visits, often spending hours at a time, and continued to find new violations even after surrendering the plate. The city’s Parking Summons Advocate’s Office said the matter had been escalated and resolved after an inquiry prompted another review, though the Finance Department did not explain the underlying error or how it was fixed. The state Department of Motor Vehicles said it would never issue the same plate combination to another registrant. Brown’s replacement vanity plate, delivered in October, read “KNALB” - her old plate reversed.