Aragon’s varsity prosecution before their trial. Courtesy of Angelina Parker.
After two years over Zoom, the Aragon mock trial team returns to in-person competitions. Throughout January and early February, the Aragon mock trial team competes against teams from other local schools.
“Mock trial is an academic competition team at Aragon where we take the roles of attorneys, witnesses and clerks to prepare for a series of competitions,” said mock trial co-captain and senior Angelina Parker. “These competitions take the form of a fake trial, hence the name mock trial.”
“We take the roles of attorneys, witnesses and clerks to prepare for a series of competitions”
The team participates in trials surrounding a fictional case, outlined in a case packet released by the California Constitutional Rights Foundation at the beginning of the school year. This year’s case is about a possible robbery and battery. Members are assigned to argue for defense or prosecution, playing the roles of attorneys, witnesses, clerks and bailiffs. This year also marks the first year Aragon has had a junior varsity team since 2020.
The trials are held on Thursday afternoons at the Redwood City Courthouse.
“[The trials] start out with introductions,” said junior Nolan Rivera. “Both teams introduce themselves, and then there’s a pre-trial argument about a certain part of the case that’s conflicting with a constitutional amendment. Both sides get their case on whether or not a certain part of the case should be admitted or not because it conflicts with this amendment.”
An attorney on each side gives their opening statements outlining the case, the points they will be arguing and the evidence they will include.
“The prosecution [then] gives their direct examinations of each witness,” Rivera said. “There are four witnesses that each follow a witness statement given in [the case packet].”
After the prosecution’s direct examination, the defense gives their cross-examination. In the cross-examination, the defense looks for holes in the prosecution’s evidence in order to use it to their advantage.
While the judge gives a verdict at the end of the trial, the winner of the trial is not always the team who wins the verdict, but rather who performed the best. Two scorers watch the trial and score the participants.
“[The scorers] watch whether you stumble on words and if [you] have everything memorized … They are the ones who dictate who truly wins”
“[The scorers] watch whether you stumble on words and if [you] have everything memorized,” said freshman Erin Finn. “They are the ones who dictate who truly wins because the judge [might] rule in favor of the defense, for example, but the prosecution will have more points [from the scorers] and so the prosecution officially wins.”
The pretrial motion and closings are scored on a scale from one to 20, the clerk and bailiff’s performance from one to five and the other parts of the trial are scored from one to 10.
To prepare for the trials, the team meets in the library on Saturdays. During these meetings, the club participates in a series of full team scrimmages, attorney witness pairings and pre-trial practices.
“In these different practices, we go over direct and cross-examinations on witnesses, opening and closing statements for attorneys and have practice with objections,” Parker said. “We also have scrimmages, either against ourselves or against other schools for practice.”
From the witnesses to the judge, a mock trial is composed of many moving parts.
“You have to pay attention to the witness in a given moment, but you also have to pay attention to objections that you can make to the other side,” Parker said. “You also have to pay attention to what specific evidence is brought up in a given moment [if you] want to bring up later in the trial, whether it’s through another witness or in your closing [statement].”
Students enjoy seeing the inner workings of a courthouse, and some also enjoy the competitive aspect of being on the team.
“It can be pretty scary going into competition, but it’s also really exciting”
“My favorite part is definitely the adrenaline,” Parker said. “It can be pretty scary going into competition, but it’s also really exciting. I find that thrill super addictive.”
The first trial was on Thursday, Jan. 26 at the Redwood City Courthouse.
“We went up against Menlo and they were very prepared for sure,” Finn said. “But we were also prepared, and we gave them a good fight. They did, however, win.”
The last trial to determine which teams go to the semifinals will be tonight.
