re: #304 Dr Lizardo

I’m not stealing this car, I’m just borrowing it at gunpoint from the owner.

You may laugh, but I can tell you this - many years ago, I worked auto sales. One fine evening, a gent brought in a car he wanted to trade in. That’s all well and good…..until he couldn’t produce the registration. See, turned out it was his ex-wife’s car, not his, though they’d purchased it together while they were still married.

His rationale: “See, she wasn’t paying the note, so I took it upon myself to repossess it”.

In other words…..he stole it.

*headdesk*

Did the police get involved at that point?

When I was in college majoring in criminal justice, a class assignment required us to go the Virginia Court of Appeals and watch a session. Some poor public defender had to get up and argue that her client wasn’t guilty because the drugs they found in his pants weren’t his because he was wearing someone else’s pants.

I found out later from the attorney who was teaching the class that wasn’t an uncommon claim made by defendants.