Mock Trial Club Excels at Arguing

A group of teenagers got up early Sunday morning (extra early, courtesy of Daylight Saving Time) to be argumentative. Nothing too unusual about that.

But theses 16 students were dressed like lawyers and arguing about bloody bricks, cyberbullying and the First and 14th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution.

The mock trial team, having won the Alameda County title in February, was scrimmaging in the school library to tune up for the state championship in Riverside March 25-27.

The discipline of mock trial “helps you think on your feet,” said Katja Collier, who is in her third year in the club. “It’s useful in almost anything. It helps with making an argument. It’s helpful any time you write an essay in school. I’m doing a lot of analyzing.”

As an attorney specializing in pretrial motions for the prosecution in Sunday's fictional trial of Jesse Woodson–a brick-wielding, blogging assailant from "Pikeville"–Collier had to be familiar with court precedents and the constitutional issues of 12 hypothetical cases that mock trial teams around the state have prepared for this season.

Collier is a senior headed to Carleton College in Minnesota next fall, but PHS's mock trial club this year is heavy on sophomores. History teacher Courtney Goen said she has seen a lot of development this year.

“That’s my favorite part about mock trial,” said Goen, “watching that kind of growth.”

Real world Alameda County Superior Court Judge Yvonne Gonzalez, who volunteered to preside over Sunday's proceedings, said the young club had plenty to be proud of.

“My colleagues on the bench who did preside over your competitions were incredibly impressed, so you should feel great about that,” Gonzalez Rogers told the students. “You should feel great about how far you’ve come.”
 
In Sunday's scrimmage, club members played parts on the prosecuting team and defense team, and acted as a range of witnesses from middle school assistant principal to forensic pathologist. Some students even had cameos as the bailiff and the court clerk. Colleen Fitzgerrell had to double as a prosecution and defense attorney, pacing from behind one table to behind another, because of a shuffle in the prosecution’s line-up, with Lauren Horst traveling to Virginia in pursuit of a college scholarship.

In defending Woodson against the charge that he violated the fictional Anti-Bullying and Cyberbullying of Students Act, mock trial lawyer Chris White sought to have the statute thrown out as a threat to “protected speech."

Judge Gonzalez denied the motion, saying, “The legislature is within its power to pass a statute like this.”

Evans Houser, acting as Woodson, dashed for the door when Gonzalez found him guilty of assault with a deadly weapon for hurling a brick at the back of the head of Angel Sterling, played with convincing fearfulness by Renee Lowe. The defendant was found not guilty of violating the bullying law.