I've got something similar going on here in WV. The witch at the DMV wouldn't let me transfer a signed WV title, and told me that i had to have the VIN verified by LEO. I looked up there rules and there's nothing about that in there, and verification is only needed if you don't have a title or the VIN tag is missing. There's a fee involved and I need to take time off work because they're only open during business hours.

I'm pretty sure their point is to squeeze me on sales tax, like they're doing to Zippy, or maybe it's a ploy to get a cop on my property to nose around. Either way I wish I would've known this was coming before I fixed most of what was wrong with it.