dress nice and address the judge as "your honor"
also if your were cooperative with the police officer, ask the officer to relay that to the judge...judges like to hear that your werent a pain in the ass.
dont try to talk laws with the judge...he knows them, just fix the problem (or make it look like you did) and show the judge that...hell, ive even told the judge that i dont have the car anymore/photo didnt turn out/brought in a pic of another car completely/and said that my parents took the car away from me (when i was way younger) and had those work.