FORD: Fix or Repair Daily. Fails on Rainy Days. Found on Roadside Dead.

Or FORD backwards: Driver Returns on Foot. Apologies, but apparently, I’m not the only disillusioned former Ford owner.

Greg Donlen was the former proud owner of a brand-new Ford F-450 Super Duty, equipped with a TorqShift transmission, which in addition to sounding badass, had the unfortunate habits of burning out seals, shifting erratically, and popping into neutral.

Sometimes, life sucks. You know it. We all know it. From bills to sitting in traffic in [insert metropolitan area here], the day-to-day grind can wear down your soul. Tack on an extra stressor, such as your car being towed or a medical problem, and it can feel like it’s all too much to bear.

Or you might just need to vent.

Ester Boggess called her niece on December 31, 2011. By the end of the conversation, her niece was worried enough to contact the police. The officers arrived, assessed the situation, and put Boggess on a 72-hour psychiatric hold, otherwise known as a Sec. 5150. The officers also confiscated her late husband’s firearms and pursuant to Sec. 8102, sought to dispose of them.

Lorenzo Barnes, a past-convicted felon, held up a young couple at gunpoint. One of them handed over his wallet, while the lady tossed her bright teal Prada purse under a nearby vehicle. Barnes retrieved the purse and took off.

An hour later, the purse-snatcher was in cuffs. How?

In addition to having a very conspicuous purse, she was also carrying a Palm Pre smartphone. She told the police that her phone had GPS, together they contacted Sprint, and within forty-five minutes, they had Barnes’ location. The victims also provided a physical description.

Hilariously enough, Barnes, on appeal, argues that his Fourth Amendment rights, and the related “expectation of privacy” were violated by the GPS search. The Court of Appeals, however, strongly disagrees.

We in the law like cases to settle. We like settlements so much that if a party makes a reasonable offer to settle, and the other side declines, and doesn’t land a more favorable verdict at trial, we’ll make them pick up part of the tab, specifically for expert witness testimony. You might know this as Section 998, though old-timers might recall that it was previously known as Section 997.

Where that procedural code remains silent, however, is how the court should treat multiple offers. If the plaintiff makes one reasonable offer, then makes another reasonable offer, which offer counts when the verdict rolls in?

Every full moon, Iris kills werewolves. It's what she's good at; it's what she's trained for. She's never imagined doing anything else ... until she falls in love with one. And being a professional werewolf hunter and dating a werewolf poses a serious conflict of interest. To add to her problems, a group of witches decides she is the chosen one -- destined to save humanity from the wolves at the door -- while her boss, Blake, who just happens to be her ex-husband, is hell-bent on sabotaging her new relationship.

All Iris wants is to snuggle up with her alpha wolf and be left alone. He might turn into a monster once a month, but in a lot of ways, she does, too.

Giggity, giggity. Now that sounds like an instant literary classic. And you, dear reader, have Andres Martinez to thank for the heads-up. In early 2011, he ordered a copy of The Silver Crown from his Pelican Bay cell, but was denied access to the novel after it was deemed contraband.

“[P]rovocation is not evaluated by whether the average person would act in a certain way: to kill. Instead, the question is whether the average person would react in a certain way: with his reason and judgment obscured.”

Tare Beltran began dating Claire Tempongko in 1998. Over the next two years, the relationship turned violent, with allegations of abuse, visits from the police, and eventually, a protective order. In late October, the then ex-couple argued over the phone, before Tempongko showed up to her house and stabbed her 17 times.

Forget about the movie for a second. Let's go back a bit further in the facts.

A prospective juror is asked the following question:

"25. HAVE YOU, A CLOSE FRIEND, OR RELATIVE EVER BEEN ACCUSED OF A CRIME, EVEN IF THE CASE DID NOT COME TO COURT?"

Well, that seems pretty clear, right? Not so much, if you are Pervies Ary, the eventual foreman of the Boyette jury. According to the opinion, this is his rap sheet:

Is there anything rarer than an appellate court choosing to ignore a poorly-reasoned state supreme court opinion?

Michael Pizarro has twice been convicted of murdering his 13-year-old half-sister, Amber Barfield, with special circumstances involving lewd or lascivious acts upon a child under age 14. On the night of her death in 1989, she went to retrieve her drunken older half-brother from the roadside after Pizarro had gotten into a drunken argument with his wife. Amber was found, suffocated, the following morning.

Pizarro was initially convicted largely on the basis of DNA evidence, but after numerous appeals, his conviction was vacated due to issues with the science employed. He was convicted again in 2008, but will be granted another retrial after juror misconduct brought the fairness of the retrial into question.

Drunk driver? Don't blame the underage suppliers.

This is the tale of five young girls, who did what many under-21 girls do: convinced strangers at a liquor store to buy them booze and helped supply a house party. (Think McLovin' from Superbad, only slightly more feminine.) Once the fun finished, the fabulous five hopped into a car, and soon thereafter, plowed into a bicyclist, who was severely injured. Along with his wife, he sought to sue not only the driver, but the four young ladies who provided the party favors.

Unfortunately for him, the California State Legislature was quite explicit in expressing its feelings on the subject.

In 2009, the search for a robbery suspect led police to the doorstep of convicted-felon Walter Fernandez. Police were investigating nearby when they heard the screams of his girlfriend and cohabitant, Roxanne Rojas. Once backup arrived, they knocked on the door and Rojas, with a bruised nose and bloody hand, answered.

Fernandez came to the door and refused to allow the police to enter, stating, “You don’t have any right to come in here. I know my rights.” He was taken into custody, and later identified as the suspect in the nearby robbery.

A short time later, the officers returned, notified Rojas that Fernandez was a suspect in a robbery, and asked for consent to search. She gave both written and verbal consent. The search turned up a shotgun, ammunition, a butterfly knife, and gang paraphernalia.