Student on 'Judge Mathis' TV show Friday
For Florida senior John Wimbush-Sherrod, suing his roommate meant an all-expenses paid trip to Chicago and will mean several minutes of embarrassment on national television.
Wimbush-Sherrod sued Milford junior Jacob Goodin for unpaid gas and electric bills and won the case on the legal reality TV show “Judge Mathis.”
The incident happened in the spring semester of 2009 and the segment was filmed in Chicago over the summer.
“I took (my roommate) to Judge Mathis because we were both college students and we couldn’t afford to pay the bills,” Wimbush-Sherrod said. “I wasn’t mad at him and I wanted to work things out.”
Goodin was unavailable for comment.
He said he went on the Judge Mathis Web site and submitted his dispute and was called within three days by producers. He was informed that he and his roommate would be flown out for free, be provided meals, spending money and a hotel room.
“The filming took literally two minutes in and out, but we were there for a full day and a half,” Wimbush-Sherrod said. “I hated filming because we didn’t have time to talk or tell the story. We just embarrassed each other on national TV to help them out with ratings.”
‘Didn’t do anything’
He said the producers told him to bring embarrassing pictures of his roommate or any proof that he parties, drinks, or does drugs.
“We were embarrassing each other so bad that we even started to lie since we didn’t have to take an oath,” he said. “We just wanted to look good for TV.”
Wimbush-Sherrod said even though he won the case and received $200 — half his money back — he was unsatisfied with the experience.
“Judge Mathis didn’t do anything,” he said. “He sat up in a chair, laughed at us, yelled for me to shut up when I talked, didn’t look at any facts and then made his decision off of what we were just saying.”
A retired judge of Michigan’s 36th District Court, Mathis has presided over his television court since 1999 and has filmed more than 1,000 episodes. On the series, cases are classified as tort law, which are civil disputes with a maximum $5,000 claim.
“The parties both agree contractually to go on TV and to subject themselves to a ruling and follow the ruling of the TV show’s private court,” said Kenneth Sanney, a faculty member in the finance and law department. “What it seems like is that these courts don’t have any legal jurisdiction — it’s more of a contractual situation.
Sanney said the way the court would enforce their ruling is by bringing a breach of contract lawsuit against the party that didn’t follow the court’s ruling.
“It would just create another lawsuit for a breach of contract,” he said.
