- [Bailiff] Raise your right hand.
- [Narrator] She says her roommate from hell
stiffed her on the rent and stole her clothes.
The roommate says, "Not."
- Judge, this is number 82 on the calendar
in the matter of Matthies versus Morantos.
- Be seated, everybody. Ah, Ms. Matthews?
- Yes, ma'am.
- [Judge Judy] Your complaint says that the defendant
turned out to be a roommate from hell.
- [Matthies] Oh, most definitely.
- [Judge Judy] Is that a fair statement?
- Yes.
- It was a short term relationship.
The roommate relationship lasted for about a month.
- [Crystal Matthies] Mm-hm.
- That she stole, during the course of that month,
your clothes, she invaded your checking account,
she didn't pay her rent,
all during that month's period of time.
Is that right?
- That's correct.
- Okay, where did you find her?
- We worked at the same coffee shop in Elk Grove.
We worked at La Bou, and I met her,
and she seemed nice enough,
and she was, kind of, loud and outgoing
and, kind of, obnoxious, like me.
So, we, kind of, got along good and got silly together.
- What happened when she moved in?
First couple of weeks, you say something happened.
- Yeah, in the first couple of weeks
I got a couple eviction notices.
I was too loud; the landlord had to come up and talk to me.
It was- - Well, were you loud?
- I wasn't, I always got the eviction notices.
- Hold on, you were getting drunk every night,
having multiple people over all the time,
and always had your stereo on full blast.
I worked every day.
- False. - Crystal no longer had a job.
- False.
- [Defendant] When we lived in the apartment.
- That's false. Every time-
- Did you pay her the rent when you first moved in?
- What happened was, I gave my landlord--
- The answer is either yes or no.
- No, I did not; I gave the landlord a check for the money--
- Which bounced.
- She owed me $80 for a chair that I had bought
because she didn't have enough money on her.
- [Judge Judy] She just-- - [Matthies] No, I didn't buy
that chair, you bought that chair.
I didn't want it at all,
and the rent checked out-- - Ms. Morantos,
It's sort of hard for me
to question you about your answer
because usually I get a complaint and an answer.
I have her complaint, no answer from you.
So I have to do this sort of as we go along.
You didn't pay her the rent
if you paid her the rent with a check that bounced.
Whether you paid her or paid the landlord,
you didn't pay anybody for the rent.
So you owe her.
- I would have paid her,
but she owed me $80 - [Judge Judy] What did--
- And it caused my check to bounce
and mess up my checking account.
- False. - I work at a coffee shop.
I don't make that much money.
- False
- I just want you to realize what you just said.
You said you would have paid her.
- Mm-hm
- Her grandma gave her the money.
- I did pay her,
I did pay her. - [Judge Judy] But your check
bounced. - But she owed me
$80-- - [Matthies] because she spent
all of her account. - So in my account
did not come up right because she owed me $80.
- So you didn't pay her for the time
that you lived there, is that correct?
- No.
(attendees laugh)
- If the check bounces, then nobody got paid for the rent.
- Mm-hm, but the reason the check bounced was because
she owed me money. - False.
Had she given you, just a second,
had she given you the money to put in your checking account?
- No, she had not given me the money to put in my check.
- Well then what did you write a check for?
That's a crime.
If you write a check and you know
that you don't have money in the bank.
- 'Cause I thought, she promised me
that she would have the money to me by a certain time.
So that's, and the rent had to be paid.
- That's what we call, you ever hear the expression
should-a, would-a, could-a?
That means I would've done this
and I could have done that and I should have done that.
If you don't have money in your account
and you write a check, then you know
that it's going to bounce.
So she may have promised,
but you wrote a check on an account
in which there were insufficient funds.
So you owe her for the time that you lived there.
That's clear, let's move on to issue number two.
- [Matthies] It's the bounced check.
- We go beyond the rent,
we go to stolen money from an account.
You say that she stole $400. - She did.
- From your account when, how did you find out about that
and how do you know she took that money from your account?
- Well, I came, she brought all kinds
of people into my house, like threatening me.
And they finally left and went to a party
and during those couple hours they were gone
I was a wreck, so I went for a walk.
During that time, her and a friend of hers,
which my friend Donald saw, came to my house.
She stole two thirds of my clothing,
She stole my checkbook, a Versatile card, and a $10 bill.
And I didn't know that my checks were gone
until I tried to pay rent a couple days later.
- You stopped the Versatile card?
- [Matthies] Yes.
- Checks?
- I was unaware she took the checks until--
- How did you know she wrote out the check?
- I have both the checks that she wrote; I have--
- May I see them, please?
- I have a copy of what my signature looks like
and a copy of the two checks she wrote.
She wrote 'em on the day,
I kicked her out in two days
when she stole them - Let me see them.
Who is this witness who saw her
go into the apartment, take out clothes?
- [Matthies] Donald.
- Come up here, Donald.
(gavel taps)
(Urgent music)