Transition Year Mock Trial Competition

PearofAnguish

I'm aware I may be posting in entirely the wrong forum, but we are rather desperate at this atage and are trying everywhere.
The Mock Trials are a competition held between schools where pretend cases are prepared and argued in the Four Courts. My school has gotten through to the semi-finals, and there is a possibility we might be against Castleknock, dublin or St Aloysius Cork this Saturday.
If anyone has taken part in this competition and was against either of these schools could they please get in contact with us?? It would be absolutely fantastic if we could find out anything bout their tactics, arguing styles etc.

Thirdfox

Lol, most likely you are in the wrong forum... most people here are either Gardaí, law students, college graduates and people who are (stupidedly!) looking for legal advice.

And you potential lawyers shouldn't be getting up to these underhand tricks (won't serve you well in the real law society )

*edit: good luck in the competition.

hullaballoo

There are a few people in here who have either done moot court competitions before, or are interested in it. I'd say you might get some responses that will be useful.

Just to be sure, I'm going to copy this over to TY as well.

Thirdfox

But doesn't s/he specifically want the tactics of Castleknock or St Aloysius' mooting team (of this year)? I hardly think there's anyone posting here who knows that sort of info.

Then again s/he may be asking for general mooting advice (don't think that's the case though).

hullaballoo

You might be right. This could be what they call spam. We'll just have to wait and see.

Eru

What difference does it make if someone here has prior experience? Surely the College tactics and students changes year by year according to students and alleged offence?

PearofAnguish

Was sure this wasn't the place to try, but the organizers giving us grief to try anything and everything, so here I am. Sorry.
We have posted it the TY forum too, there wasn't time to find out exactly what kind of threads are included here, and just didn't want to miss anyone who may have also taken part in the competition this year. True, previous experience with them wouldn't be much use. Any random advice is always appreciated, though, me being only solicitor can't do much with it.
Sorry, chancing my arm, very appreciative of the lack of burns, thanks. Sorry for bringing up complete irrelevencies.

Thirdfox

Do tell us the case when you get it though (don't think we're allowed to help but it'd be a nice distraction from studying for exams )

PearofAnguish

Well the case on Saturday is DPP vs Jackie O'Faoláin. O'Faoláin is accused of assualting a woman (Breathnach) on a duel-carriagway after she stopped her car in front of her van to check for damage after thinking the van had hit her. She had bruising to her legs and wrists and says she was kicked by O'Faoláin and the passenger of the van.
O'Faoláin says Breathnach stole her keys though the car window, and that she only used what force was neccesary to retrieve them.
A woman watching from an office block across the carriageway says she didn't see Breathnach take the keys but also didn't see her get kicked. This took place at 6.15 in the morning. A man in the back of the van says he saw a hand come through the front window and take the keys, but can't indentify it.
We're the Prosecution, and were the Defence last week so are still a bit confused...
If anyone feels like offering any tips (if your conscience allows;) ) we'd be grateful. Virtual cookie baking kind of grateful.

padser

PearofAnguish wrote:

Well the case on Saturday is DPP vs Jackie O'Faoláin. O'Faoláin is accused of assualting a woman (Breathnach) on a duel-carriagway after she stopped her car in front of her van to check for damage after thinking the van had hit her. She had bruising to her legs and wrists and says she was kicked by O'Faoláin and the passenger of the van.
O'Faoláin says Breathnach stole her keys though the car window, and that she only used what force was neccesary to retrieve them.
A woman watching from an office block across the carriageway says she didn't see Breathnach take the keys but also didn't see her get kicked. This took place at 6.15 in the morning. A man in the back of the van says he saw a hand come through the front window and take the keys, but can't indentify it.
We're the Prosecution, and were the Defence last week so are still a bit confused...
If anyone feels like offering any tips (if your conscience allows;) ) we'd be grateful. Virtual cookie baking kind of grateful.

Hey Pearl of Anhuish,
I took part in that competition when I was in fourth year. I was the barrister for both prosectution and defence (obviously in different cases) in that case and the other one involving a fight over a pool table (If memory serves).

The only pointers I can remeber from the cases were

~ Know the cases inside out, the witness statements etc.
~ Pull up the witnesses (obviously not your own ones) on inconsistencies between their oral evidence and the statements they made (which you should have)
~ Dont worry about points of law at all. Not relevent.
~ Be aware as the prosectution that you must prove 'beyond reasonable doubt' (or as it was put to us 99% or more). So the defence dont have to prove anything, merely cast doubt on your case.
~ Make sure your closing arguements reflect what happened in the trial, not what you expected to happen. This is extremely important as many teams go in with learnt off closing statements with things like 'Witness X told us .....'. I remember standing up in my closing statement and taking apart the other team as the witness had never said that on the stand. I think it scored highly as the judge remarked on it (favourably) afterwards (and we won). So write only an outline of your closing argument before the trial, and ensure that you only include in it things that happened in court.
~ Ensure you ask all relevent questions of the witnesses so you have all info out in court that you need for your arguments.

Dont get nervous about it either, at the end of the day its just a game, and is (or was when I did it) great craic.