You Love Them Knives, Don’t You? The $50 Judgment That Ended a Pregnant Woman’s Knife Wielding Romance

She keyed his car. She flattened his tires. She threatened his family with a knife while five months pregnant. Then she sued him for damages to her own Mercedes after his family mobbed her at a motorcycle club on Halloween night.

He countersued for a car payment and a down payment – after she cut up his backseat with a razor blade she found in their son’s diaper bag.

The judge did math involving weeks of car usage, subtracted one judgment from the other, and left her with exactly $50 – enough for “cigarettes and Twinkies” when she goes to jail.

This is the story of Loreal and Kamani – and the $50 that closed the craziest case Judge Mathis ever heard.

The Cold Open
Loreal Barnes met Kamani Love in the spring of 2005.

The relationship started great. Then Loreal found out Kamani wasn’t honest about his “lifestyle.” He said he had one kid. He actually had two. He said his ex-girlfriend was in the Navy. She was actually staying with him.

Loreal stayed anyway.

By May 2006, she was pregnant with their son.

By Halloween 2006, she was jumping out of her car at a motorcycle club, grabbing a knife from under her seat, and trying to cut Kamani’s family member – while five months pregnant – because Kamani wasn’t answering his phone.

“Me knowing how that club is and what they’re capable of doing, I had a knife with me,” Loreal explained to the judge.

“You did what?” the judge asked.

“Grabbed my knife.”

“You love them knives, don’t you?” the judge would later say.

This is the hinged sentence of the opening: A five-month pregnant woman brought a knife to a motorcycle club on Halloween night, tried to cut someone, and then sued her ex-boyfriend for the damage to her car when his family fought back.

You cannot make this up.

Part One: The Lies at the Beginning
Kamani wasn’t honest from the start.

Loreal testified that he told her he had one child. The truth was two. He said his ex-girlfriend was in the Navy. The truth was she was living with him.

Loreal found this out four months into the relationship.

She stayed anyway.

“I still stayed in a relationship with him,” she admitted.

The judge didn’t comment on this. He didn’t have to. Everyone in the courtroom already knew where this was heading.

When you ignore red flags at the beginning, you don’t get to act surprised when those red flags become emergencies.

Loreal ignored them.

Then she got pregnant.

Then Halloween happened.

Part Two: Halloween Night
Kamani and Loreal made plans to hang out on Halloween.

Then Kamani stopped answering his phone.

Loreal got suspicious. She figured Kamani was “trying to play family with his ex and their kids.”

So she went looking for him.

Kamani’s family members were part of a motorcycle club. Loreal knew where the club was located. She figured Kamani might be there.

She drove to the club. She saw Kamani’s car parked outside.

“I jumped out and went inside the club,” she said.

She didn’t find Kamani inside.

So she went back to her car and parked next to his.

That’s when she looked in her rearview mirror and saw Kamani’s mother approaching her car.

With a mob behind her.

The judge interrupted. “You sure you didn’t say anything out the way inside that motorcycle club?”

Loreal insisted she didn’t. But she admitted she had “previous run-ins” with Kamani’s family. They had seen her act violently before. They assumed she was going to be reckless again.

“His family members started like engaging around me to attack me,” Loreal said.

This is the second hinged sentence: Loreal brought a knife to a motorcycle club, then blamed the mob for attacking her – while admitting she tried to cut someone first.

Part Three: The Knife
Here’s what happened outside the club.

Kamani’s mother approached Loreal’s car with a cell phone. She told Loreal, “You need to get up out of here now.”

Loreal said, “Don’t say nothing to me. I don’t have to go nowhere.”

Then a family member opened Loreal’s car door. She said, “Well, Kamani’s not here, but I am. What’s up?”

Loreal said, “I’m not looking for you. Just don’t touch my car.”

The family member slammed Loreal’s car door shut.

That’s when Loreal grabbed her knife from under the seat.

The judge couldn’t believe it. “You did what? Grab your knife?”

“Yeah, I’m five months pregnant,” Loreal explained. “I didn’t want to endanger my child.”

The judge’s response was immediate. “Not endangering your child would have meant putting the car in drive.”

But Loreal didn’t leave. She had “unfinished business.”

“What was that?” the judge asked.

“I needed an explanation to why he ditched me.”

“Even when you saw the mob, you still needed an explanation despite the fact you were pregnant,” the judge said.

Loreal jumped out of the car with the knife. She tried to cut Kamani’s family member.

She missed.

Then she saw Kamani coming across the street. He was handing his brother a gun.

The family members started attacking her car. They broke her mirrors. They snatched the Mercedes star off the back. Someone karate kicked her car and left an ugly dent.

Loreal got back in her car and drove away.

She didn’t call the police.

The judge pointed out why: “You attacked people with a knife. When you come at someone with a knife, that’s felonious assault, and you subjected yourself to several years in prison.”

Loreal admitted she didn’t cut anyone. But the judge wasn’t impressed. “As long as you know.”

Part Four: The Gift That Wasn’t a Gift
Loreal was suing Kamani for car damages.

Why? Because he said he was going to pay for them.

“He told me he was going to pay for it as a gift,” Loreal said. “Because his family was held responsible.”

The judge explained the law. “Until he gave you that money, he did not have to complete the gift. By law, he didn’t have to give you a dime.”

Loreal tried to argue. “He held himself responsible for his family’s actions. He did say he was going to pay for my car damages.”

“That’s a gift,” the judge said. “First of all, you don’t think attacking someone with a knife is a felonious assault. Now you tell me when a person promises they’re going to give you money for no reason, you don’t believe that’s a gift.”

Loreal tried to interrupt. “Okay, Judge Mathis, there was a reason—”

The judge cut her off. “Until you go to law school, don’t try to tell me the law.”

Loreal’s car damages claim was going nowhere.

Part Five: Kamani’s Confession
Then Kamani took the stand.

He admitted he lied to Loreal at the beginning. He had a family. He had kids. He wasn’t single.

“She got pregnant,” Kamani said. The courtroom laughed. He clarified: “By me.”

After Loreal got pregnant, she started having mood swings. She wanted things to be different between them. She started popping up at his house.

“She came by, keyed up my car, put my tires on flat,” Kamani said.

The judge turned to Loreal. “Is this true? You did this?”

Loreal’s answer was simple: “Yes.”

She admitted it. No hesitation. No excuse. Just “yes.”

Then Kamani said something interesting. “I kind of blame myself. I thought that since she was pregnant, she was just having mood swings and everything. So I still was dealing with her.”

The judge stopped him. “What are you talking about, you kind of blame yourself?”

Kamani explained: because she was pregnant, he kept giving her chances. He kept dating her even after she vandalized his car.

The judge wasn’t having it. “If she had walked up to you at your house and shot you in the head, your last thoughts would have been ‘I deserve this’?”

The point was clear. Blaming yourself for someone else’s violence doesn’t excuse the violence.

Part Six: The Phone Bill
Loreal was also suing for an unpaid phone bill.

Their son was born in February 2007. Loreal thought they needed reliable communication. She didn’t have a job. She told Kamani she couldn’t pay for a phone.

“He said it’s okay, just get the phones in your name, and I’ll pay for both of them,” Loreal testified.

Kamani paid $190 toward the first bill.

Then he never paid again.

The bill grew to $1,880.

Kamani didn’t deny it. “It’s true,” he said. He admitted he used the phone until July.

The judge asked what the phone was used for.

“Phone calls with his ex-girlfriend,” Loreal said. “He ordered TV shows and everything on there.”

Kamani didn’t argue.

The phone bill claim was solid. Kamani had promised to pay. He had paid once. Then he stopped. The evidence was clear.

Part Seven: The Car Counterclaim
Kamani countersued for $1,920.

Here’s the story.

Kamani wanted to buy a car. The seller wouldn’t give him the car because Kamani didn’t have a driver’s license.

So Kamani asked Loreal if she would put the car in her name.

She said yes.

Kamani put down a down payment. He made the first payment. The down payment was $1,700, plus a balloon payment of $300. Total: $2,000.

Then things fell apart.

Kamani was coming home from work. His phone died. He knew he was supposed to pick up their son so Loreal could go to work.

So he stopped at his ex-girlfriend’s job to use her phone.

He called Loreal from his ex’s phone.

Loreal was furious.

“She started going off,” Kamani said. “That’s when I went to go pay—”

The judge interrupted. “Are you about to get stabbed?”

The courtroom laughed.

“You got the weakest game I’ve heard,” the judge said. “You’re going to call from your other woman’s phone?”

Kamani tried to defend himself. “I was on my way to pick up my son. I’m trying to help her out.”

But the damage was done.

Loreal told Kamani to come bring her house keys. She said she didn’t need him to take their son anymore.

Kamani agreed to drop off the keys.

When he got to Loreal’s house, she said, “You can get out of the car, too, because I’m going to take the car.”

Loreal denied saying this.

Then things got physical.

Loreal pulled out a razor blade. She cut up Kamani’s back seat.

“Why would you do that?” Kamani asked.

Loreal’s parents came outside. Kamani tried to get Loreal’s father to control her. “Can’t none of y’all control this woman?” he said.

Loreal came at Kamani with the razor blade.

But Loreal had an explanation. “I got the blade from him, Your Honor. He left it in my son’s diaper bag. It’s not like I had it on me. I just got it from him.”

The judge’s response was dry: “You love them knives, don’t you?”

Part Eight: The Arrest
After the razor blade incident, Kamani got in the car and left.

Loreal called the police. She said Kamani stole the car. That he jacked it.

Kamani’s people called him. They told him the police were at Loreal’s house taking a report.

Kamani went to the police station to find out what Loreal had said about him.

When he got there, the police arrested him. They didn’t want to hear his side. They just took him to jail.

Kamani had used the car for about two weeks.

The car payment was $250 a month.

The judge did the math.

Part Nine: The Judge’s Math
Judge Mathis hated math.

“This is why I became a lawyer instead of a mathematician or a banker or anything else that requires the use of numbers,” he said.

But he did it anyway.

Kamani used the car for two weeks out of a month. The car note was $250. Two weeks is half a month.

Half of $250 is $125.

But Loreal argued Kamani only used the car for about a week.

The judge split the difference. “That reduces the amount he owes you. Split it in half, that’s $62.50.”

Kamani’s counterclaim was for $1,920.

 

 

Minus $62.50 for the week of car usage.

That left $1,857.50.

But the judge wasn’t done.

Part Ten: The Final Calculation
The judge granted Loreal her phone bill: $1,880.

The judge granted Kamani his counterclaim: $1,857.50.

Then the judge subtracted.

$1,880 minus $1,857.50 equals $22.50.

Wait.

The judge said $50.

Maybe he rounded up. Maybe he did the math differently. Maybe he just picked a number that sounded right.

Either way, the result was the same: Loreal was getting almost nothing.

“Subtracting his judgment from yours, you’re left with $50,” the judge said.

Then he added a line that would echo through small claims court history.

“So you can put that on your books so that when you go to jail, you can get you some cigarettes and Twinkies.”

The courtroom erupted in applause.

Loreal walked out with $50.

Kamani walked out with a story about the time his ex-girlfriend tried to cut someone with a knife while five months pregnant and ended up with enough money for a snack.

The Knife Appears Again
The knife appeared three times in this story.

First, as protection. Loreal was five months pregnant. She was surrounded by a mob at a motorcycle club. She grabbed her knife from under the seat to protect herself and her unborn child.

Second, as a weapon. She jumped out of the car and tried to cut Kamani’s family member. She missed – but the intent was clear. She wasn’t defending herself. She was attacking.

Third, as a pattern. The razor blade came later. Kamani left it in their son’s diaper bag. Loreal found it and used it to cut up his backseat. Then she came at him with it. Knives, razor blades – Loreal had a type.

“You love them knives, don’t you?” the judge asked.

Loreal didn’t answer.

She didn’t have to.

The knives told the story themselves.

The Halloween Costume
Let’s think about Halloween for a moment.

Loreal was five months pregnant on Halloween night. She had plans with Kamani. He didn’t show up. He didn’t answer his phone.

She went looking for him.

She found his car at a motorcycle club.

She went inside. She didn’t find him.

She came back outside. His mother approached with a mob.

Loreal grabbed a knife.

This is not a normal reaction to being stood up on Halloween.

This is not a normal reaction to anything.

Loreal was dressed as a pregnant woman with a knife. That was her costume. That was who she was that night.

And she wore that costume to court, too.

The Ex-Girlfriend’s Phone
Kamani made a terrible decision.

His phone died. He needed to call Loreal to tell her he was on his way to pick up their son. So he stopped at his ex-girlfriend’s job and used her phone.

Think about that.

He had other options. He could have borrowed a phone from a stranger. He could have used a payphone. He could have driven directly to Loreal’s house and explained in person.

Instead, he called from his ex’s phone.

The woman he had lied about at the beginning of his relationship with Loreal. The woman he said was in the Navy who was actually living with him. The woman who was the reason Loreal went to the motorcycle club in the first place.

Kamani called Loreal from that woman’s phone.

“You got the weakest game I’ve heard,” the judge said.

He wasn’t wrong.

The Razor Blade in the Diaper Bag
Loreal found a razor blade in their son’s diaper bag.

She said Kamani left it there.

Maybe he did. Maybe he didn’t. The judge didn’t investigate. But the image is haunting.

A razor blade. In a diaper bag. Next to diapers and wipes and baby powder.

Their son was born in February 2007. The razor blade incident happened sometime after that. The baby was less than a year old.

A razor blade in a diaper bag is not normal. It’s not safe. It’s not something a parent does by accident.

Loreal found it. She didn’t throw it away. She didn’t call Kamani and ask why there was a razor blade next to their son’s diapers.

She kept it.

Then she used it to cut up Kamani’s backseat.

Then she came at him with it.

“You love them knives, don’t you?” the judge asked.

Loreal loved weapons. She loved using them. She loved threatening people with them.

The razor blade was just the latest in a long line of sharp objects Loreal couldn’t keep her hands off.

What This Case Teaches Us
First: A promise to give a gift is not legally enforceable.

Kamani said he would pay for Loreal’s car damages as a gift. The judge explained that until the money changes hands, the gift doesn’t exist. You can’t sue someone for not completing a gift.

Second: If you attack someone with a knife, don’t expect a judge to side with you.

Loreal tried to cut Kamani’s family member. She admitted it. The judge reminded her that felonious assault carries years in prison. She was lucky she wasn’t the one being sued.

Third: Phone bills are enforceable. Car damages from a fight you started are not.

Loreal got her phone bill money. The judge granted that claim. But her car damages? Denied. You can’t start a fight, get your car damaged in that fight, and then sue your ex-boyfriend for the damage.

Fourth: When you put a car in someone else’s name, you’re taking a risk.

Kamani put the car in Loreal’s name because he didn’t have a license. Then Loreal took the car back. Kamani lost the down payment and the first payment. He got some credit for using the car for a week – but not enough to make him whole.

Fifth: Fifty dollars is not a victory.

Loreal walked out with $50. The judge suggested she use it for cigarettes and Twinkies when she goes to jail. That’s not a compliment. That’s a judge telling you that your case was nonsense and you’re lucky to leave with anything.

The Mercedes Star
Let’s go back to the motorcycle club.

Loreal’s Mercedes had a star on the back. Someone from Kamani’s family snatched it off. They karate kicked her car and left an ugly dent.

Loreal was upset about this. She wanted Kamani to pay for it.

But she had brought a knife. She had tried to cut someone. She had escalated the situation from a verbal argument to a weapons-grade confrontation.

You don’t get to sue for damages when you’re the one who started the violence.

The Mercedes star is gone. The dent is still there – or it was, until Loreal got it fixed, or didn’t.

But the symbol remains. A luxury car on a cheap person. A star that got ripped off because its owner couldn’t control her temper.

That’s not a car problem. That’s a life problem.

The Judge’s Patience
Judge Mathis handled this case with remarkable patience.

He listened to Loreal explain why she brought a knife to a motorcycle club while pregnant.

He listened to Kamani explain why he called his ex-girlfriend from his ex-girlfriend’s phone.

He listened to both of them argue about car payments and phone bills and whose fault it was that a mob attacked a Mercedes.

Then he did the math.

Then he made a joke about jail and Twinkies.

Then he dismissed them both.

“Have a good day,” he said.

The courtroom applauded.

Because after an hour of knives and razor blades and motorcycle clubs and pregnant women attacking people, everyone was ready to go home.

The Final Word
Loreal Barnes and Kamani Love had a child together.

That child was born in February 2007. By July, his parents were in court, suing each other over phones and cars and knives.

The judge gave Loreal $50.

Fifty dollars.

That’s not enough to fix a Mercedes. That’s not enough to pay a phone bill. That’s not enough to do anything except buy cigarettes and Twinkies – which is exactly what the judge suggested.

Kamani lost his down payment and his car.

Loreal lost her case and her credibility.

Their son lost something no one in that courtroom could measure: parents who couldn’t stop fighting long enough to be parents.

The judge didn’t mention the boy.

He didn’t have to.

Everyone in that room knew the real victim wasn’t a Mercedes or a phone bill or a car payment.

It was a child born into a war zone.

And fifty dollars wouldn’t fix that.