SIRIUS can not locate my ESN

My Startac radio went out and I bought a Sportster off Craigslist about 3 years ago with the intention of transferring my subscription to it. When I hooked it up, it already worked so I let my subscrition expire and rode out what I thought could be a 2 year or 3 year sub. The subscription on the Sportster never expired but the tuner is going out. I called Sirius to see if I could transfer the subscription to a new radio but was told they had no record of the Sportsters ESN. I thought I might have got lucky and bought a radio with a lifetime subscription. How can I have received The signal for 3-4 years without Sirius having record of it. How can I transfer to a new account. Any help will be appreciated.

Thanks.
DH

For them to transfer that account they would have to strip the personal and payment information from it and I don't ever see that happening. I'm not saying it wouldn't be awesome but, think about what you are asking them to do. Giving non transferable lifetime subs to other members is a bad business model :)

Well we don't offer anything over a 3 year contract. which means one of 2 things. One, someone is still paying for this radio, or 2 and the most likely (and very common)... When cancelling service the antenna was in a garage and did not receive the deactivation signal that we send out at time of cancellation. Usually it goes for about 6 months before losing the signal, but sometimes it has been known to go on for years. As for the ESN, that is a tricky thing. The tool used, has a field that is filled in. Like google searching the
number. When searching it if it comes up blank it means it's not active (Thus my Theory #2). Try setting it up as a new radio just to check it out on SiriusXM.com see if it comes up.