HH56 wrote:
Don may be able to give more specific details but I think you will be out of luck getting anything from the state which would be about the only way to track ownership. Without state records, the only way to trace previous owners will be if you have word of mouth or some kind of unofficial paper trail from somewhere else. Unknown if anyone has any of the dealership records from that specific dealer but I expect those would only provide the first owner.

As to the state, California drops vehicles out of the system if they have not been continually registered for, I think, 5 years. If it has been longer than that since being registered in Calif there will be no records. Even if the car is still in the system, due to an actress being stalked and murdered a few years ago by someone who found her address thru DMV, after that happened there was a state law enacted that prohibits DMV from sharing any info with someone other than need to know law enforcement thru a special computer hookup or a warrant.