The San Juan County Superior Court courtroom fills with people. Defense and prosecution attorneys whisper amongst themselves as they prepare for a murder trial.
“All rise,” the court clerk bellows, and everyone stands as Judge Carla Higginson enters the room.
This is a mock trial starring the students of Friday Harbor High School.
The San Juan County Bar Association has worked with the school district, particularly civics teachers for the past 12 years, Higginson said. The students have approximately three weeks to prepare for their case. There are three cases this year, covering everything from science to murder. To help them, attorneys from the SJCBA volunteer their time to coach students on strategies, and to work through and understand the court process, according to Higginson. During the May 25 trial, which focused on an environmental case, Katie Loring and Steven Brandli acted as coaches. These cases are written by judges and lawyers, and while they obviously draw from real life experiences, they are written specifically for students to use as mock trials across the country. They are intentionally written with gray areas, to give each side a good argument.
On May 26, during the “murder trial,” John Wickam and Thomas Sandtrum coached the students. These coaching attorneys do not play an active role at the trial, it is up to the students to act on what they have learned. The jury is sworn in, as well as the witnesses, who are examined and crossed examined. Judge Higginson rules on objections, and although she does carefully explain what is happening, it is very much a real mini mock trial.
The murder case was “Cop shoots person of interest”: a woman police officer is on trial for shooting a person of interest after her German Shepherd collapses, dead. Assuming the dog had been shot, she fires at a person of interest standing in a dark alley whom she can tell is holding something shiny. As it turns out, the German Shepherd was not shot but died of natural causes, and the suspect was holding a cell phone.
Bullet wounds indicate the male suspect was shot at close range. The officer is charged with First Degree murder, and Manslaughter. The defense argues that it was not close range, that the bullet bounced against the brick building, falsely giving the impression it was close range.
In the end, the jury found that the officer acted recklessly by shooting into a dark alley without and was guilty of both murder in the first, and manslaughter.
“We may have had a cultural advantage with all the media coverage of situations like this,” Coach for the prosecution team Wickham said, “Both teams did an amazing job.” He added that he has participated in this event since 2003, and it is his absolute favorite activity every year.
“Its a great learning experience for the kids,” Higginson said, “Some have even decided to become attorneys as a result of this project.”
Court system
Higginson provided an overview of the U.S. court system beginning with its history. The system, Higginson explained to the crowd, takes a lot of its traditions from the days when people took their complaints before the king, hence the name courtroom. The attorneys, witnesses and jury are all high schools students from Friday Harbor High’s civic’s class, taught by Kevin Kindelberger.
