We all have that one thing we can’t bear to throw away. For Ms. Hudson, it was her old Chevy Impala. It was rusted, it was aging, and it was tired, but she loved it. When the car finally gave up the ghost, she took it to a local mechanic, Mr. Lofton, hoping for a miracle.

Instead of a miracle, she got a “business deal” that would eventually lead her straight to the sharpest tongue in television history: Judge Judy.

The Deal That Felt Like a Favor

According to the transcript, Mr. Lofton convinced Ms. Hudson that her beloved Impala was beyond repair. “It’s not worth fixing,” he told her. He suggested she sell it to him for scrap parts. In exchange, he offered $400 worth of mechanical work on the couple’s two other vehicles.

Reluctantly, Ms. Hudson agreed. She signed over the title, thinking her car was headed for the graveyard. She watched him drive her “other” cars for a few months and moved on with her life.

Then came the shock.

The Ghost on the Highway

Imagine driving down the street only to see your “dead” car cruising past you, looking very much alive. Ms. Hudson spotted her beloved Impala being driven by a total stranger. As it turned out, Mr. Lofton hadn’t scrapped the car at all. He had fixed it up and sold it as a working vehicle to a third party.

Ms. Hudson was livid. She felt “frauded.” In her eyes, he had lied about the car’s condition just to “lick his chops” and turn a profit. She wanted her car back, or at least the profit he made.

“That’s America!”

The courtroom tension peaked when Judge Judy dropped a cold dose of reality. While Ms. Hudson felt betrayed by someone she trusted, Judy saw it through the lens of the law: An Arm’s-Length Transaction.

“That’s business! That’s America!” Judy famously declared.

She explained that unless there is a specific contract or a “fiduciary duty” (like the relationship you have with a lawyer or a doctor), a mechanic doesn’t have to be your best friend. He’s allowed to make a profit. If he says he can’t fix it, and you don’t get a second opinion, that’s on you.

The Twist: The Title Trap

Just when it seemed Mr. Lofton was going to walk away completely scot-free, Ms. Hudson’s husband stepped up with a crucial detail.

The issue wasn’t just the “betrayal”—it was a legal nightmare. Mr. Lofton had sold the car to a new owner without switching the title out of Ms. Hudson’s name. Because both Hudsons held Commercial Drivers Licenses (CDLs), having a stranger drive a car registered to them was a massive liability. If that stranger got into an accident or committed a crime, the Hudsons’ livelihoods were at stake.

The husband eventually had to “junk the title” himself through the DMV to protect his license, but the damage to their trust was already done.

The Moral: “Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda”

In the end, Judge Judy offered no legal remedy for Ms. Hudson’s broken heart over the Impala. The law doesn’t protect you from a bad deal or a sneaky businessman—it only protects you from broken contracts.

As the plaintiff herself aptly put it: “Shoulda, woulda, coulda.”