Why hadn’t these trucks been booted long ago? Because, the city alleged, their owners traded them for token prices, as little as $200, between scores of shell companies. One ice cream truck, which racked up $219,000 in unpaid fines between 2010 and 2017, was traded twelve times between thirteen different shell companies, adopting thirteen different license plates in the process. Each time, the truck would be transferred before the city could collect.
