Murder lingered in the air as tensions rose amongst opposing teams in the Ventura County Superior Courtroom as the Mock Trial Team prepared to present their case in People v. Clark Feb. 3 for their annual competition.
Mock Trial is a club that allows students to learn about how the justice system operates and gain foundational knowledge of law. Students in a Mock Trial competition simulate a real courtroom experience where lawyers present their arguments and respond to objections and rulings by a judge.
Senior Russell Delgado played the role of the defendant Tobie Clark in the first round of the competition who was accused of having killed the Chief Executive Officer of a billion-dollar medical technology corporation with a wine saber. Delgado described his experience as stress-inducing.
“I felt my heart beating out of my neck,” Delgado said. “I [was] stressed that I was going to slip up and convict myself.”
The competition consisted of two, seven-hour days of presenting and hearing arguments. Day one was described by junior Solana Warren as being “difficult” because it was the team’s first day in the courtroom and students were still learning the ropes of how the competition went about.
“Don’t mess up, don’t forget what you’re saying,” senior Spencer Paredes, playing the role of the Clerk and Defense Attorney said. “Sometimes they object you and you lose your train of thought.”
Presenting in general may be a scary experience, but with your team’s success on the line and a timer ticking, the pressure is stacked like never before. The second day the team had a overall better performance as presented their cases against two schools, and were more confident in their knowledge.
“I felt like our overall performance was stronger especially regarding objections, which are one of the more difficult skills to master as a lawyer,” junior Nissa Lancaster who played the role of a lawyer said. “We did a lot better at responding to objections and we took the things we saw other teams doing and adapted it into our own strategy.”
Mock trial came out successful, winning both rounds. Each team member was scored individually. All the points were added at the end to attain the teams score and the team that had the highest total score out of all the people in every role, got the win of a ballot. Total there were 2 ballots per round, by winning both, you won the round. Criminal law teacher and mock trial advisor Lauren Rad was especially proud of the team’s resilience despite not doing so well the first day.
“It would have been easy for them to go home and give up,” Rad said. “I was really proud of them for digging deep and finding the internal motivation to keep going and do better than the day before.”
Senior Solana Warren, playing the role of pre-trial attorney, was satisfied with her team’s performance and especially enjoyed the moments in the competitions when lawyers had “breakthroughs”.
“[The lawyers] have an idea about their argument and run with it and they show us a new argument that they are really excited about . . . they respond really well under cross-examination or under a question from the judge,” Warren said.
In face of the challenges that mock trial encompassed, they were able to persevere and in the end, came out with a win.
“I love seeing the team grow in confidence,” Rad said.“[Watching] them grow up, and become stronger and skilled, and more comfortable in their own skin and their Mock Trial roles is really rewarding,” Rad said.
