Of course there is. There should be a VIN engraved on the engine somewhere. If it is chiseled off, you KNOW it is hot. If you can read it, a friendly officer should be able to check with NCIC to see if it is reported stolen. Since it came by shipment, checking the local and state registries is probably a dead end, most likely it came from another state.
You can also probably pay $7.95 or whatever and look the VIN up yourself in one of the on-line motor vehicle reports databases, and find out who the last owner was, and whether it was last totalled out by the insuror. Not that I'm actually suggesting that you should spend real money on this, but we ARE getting curious. This sort of "gift" doesn't happen too often. If you know somebody at a car dealer, they might look the VIN up on their databases for you.
Jon