The doors open a little wider for students this year as there will be Varsity, Junior Varsity, and Freshman teams unlike last year, when there were not enough legal advisers for a Freshman team. Currently, the teams are still making arrangements for the advisers for JV and Freshman.

Despite that, the teams are continuing to prepare their cases. Characters for witnesses and sides (Defense or Prosecution) for attorneys have been decided.

Now, the teams are left to digest the case law -the precedents that impact their case- with their advisers and then start to work on their own cases. Openings, closing, direct and cross examinations are all written by the students.

“When you cross a witness, you never know what is going to happen. You try to plan on what to ask, but you never know what the witness will say,” said Grace Creek, 11.

Students are graded based on performance, so the team that presents the facts and their case best is the winner.

This year’s case concerns a man alleging that his past attorney biased his trial against him because of her incompetence. The trial asks the question if the attorney impacted the results of that proceeding, which was nearly 20 years ago.

“You use a lot of improv and have to be ready to fight any objection that comes your way,” Creek said.

Teacher adviser Mr. Andrew Oakes is still communicating with legal advisers as well as other schools to arrange scrimmages.

There are four attorneys and four witnesses per team which is split in half over Prosecution and Defense. The teams will not compete against each other but will help the others create well-rounded cases that takes in the other side’s points.

While competition is not until January, the invitationals begin in November/December. Also, there is a lot to prepare for as the students are trying to make this as much like a real life case as possible.

“Mock Trial builds a lot of confidence and allows me to be better at public speaking,” Creek said.

Last year, the Varsity team made it to State.