State mock-trial champs seek U.S. title

Har-Ber team represents state in national mock trial contest

Sheridan Ellis, a senior member of the Har-Ber High School Mock Trial team, questions a witness Tuesday during practice at the school in Springdale. The team is traveling to Boise, Idaho, to represent Arkansas in the National High School Mock Trial Championship.
Sheridan Ellis, a senior member of the Har-Ber High School Mock Trial team, questions a witness Tuesday during practice at the school in Springdale. The team is traveling to Boise, Idaho, to represent Arkansas in the National High School Mock Trial Championship.

SPRINGDALE -- With the mock trial team headed to its first national contest, Fayetteville attorney Cliff Plunkett offered some tough last-minute critiques.

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NWA Democrat-Gazette

Bob Estes (from left) and Cliff Plunkett, both Fayetteville-based attorneys and attorney-coaches for the Har-Ber High School Mock Trial team, lead a critique Tuesday alongside Anthony Mc-Mullen, vice chairman of the State Mock Trial Committee for the Arkansas Bar Association, during practice at the school.

photo

NWA Democrat-Gazette

Anna Cook, a junior member of the Har-Ber High School Mock Trial team, questions a witness Tuesday during practice at the school in Springdale. The team is traveling to Boise, Idaho, to represent Arkansas in the National High School Mock Trial Championship.

Senior Mary Benchoff seemed too energetic and bubbly when she sat on the witness stand giving testimony as 62-year-old cattle rancher Luz Bennett, Plunkett said. He had similar comments for her teammate, senior Ethan Martinez, another witness whose character, 54-year-old Gabriel Echevaria, works for Bennett.

National High School Mock Trial Championship

• Initiated in 1984 in Des Moines, Iowa, with teams from Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska and Wisconsin.

• Arkansas began sending teams to the championship in 1987.

• 2016 championship involves teams from 43 states, the Commonwealth of Northern Mariana Islands, Guam and South Korea.

• The annual Arkansas Bar Association Mock Trial Competition gives high school student teams from across the state the opportunity to act as lawyers and witnesses in simulated civil trials before actual judges and panels of juries.

• Lawyers volunteer to assist students as team advisers, scorekeepers and regional coordinators.

• The Arkansas champion represents the state in the national championship.

Source: Websites for National High School Mock Trial Championship and Arkansas High School Mock Trial.

Arkansas High School Mock Trial champions

• 2016: Har-Ber High School

• 2015: Parkview Arts/Science Magnet High School (Little Rock)

• 2014: Parkview Arts/Science Magnet High School (Little Rock)

• 2013: Little Rock Central High School

• 2012: Little Rock Central High School

• 2011: Jonesboro High School

• 2006-2010: Parkview Arts/Science Magnet High School (Little Rock)

• 2005: Rogers High School

Source: Arkansas Bar Association

"Part of what you are assessed on is how you are as a witness," Plunkett said. "The judge shouldn't see a teenager. Think about ways you can make the judge believe you are that person."

Benchoff and Martinez are on the Har-Ber High School mock trial team that won the Arkansas High School Mock Trial Championship in March. The team is representing the state this weekend in the 2016 National High School Mock Trial Championship in Boise, Idaho.

Parkview Arts and Science Magnet High School in the Little Rock School District has been the state champion seven times since 2005, according to the Arkansas Bar Association, which oversees the state contest. Rogers High School was the last Northwest Arkansas team to be the state champion in 2005.

Mock trial contests give high school students experience acting as lawyers and witnesses in simulated civil trials before actual judges and panels of juries.

The Har-Ber team began preparing for the Idaho competition April 1 when the 2016 National Mock Trial civil case was released. The fictional case, detailed over 92 pages, focuses on Idaho sheepherder Illan Zabala, who accuses a prominent cattle rancher, Bennett, of infecting Zabala's sheep with a fatal "bluetongue" disease.

The Har-Ber team met for a final practice Tuesday before leaving for an early flight Wednesday. The team competed in the first two rounds of the national contest Friday -- as the defense against a Michigan team and as the plaintiff against a Utah team. They have two more rounds today.

The top two teams after four rounds advance to a final round to determine the national champion, according to the contest rules.

The Har-Ber mock trial team is just a few years old. When the team started, Ta-Neisha Marshall, head debate coach and oral communications teacher, called the state Bar Association and asked for help working with a talented group of students who were new to mock trial.

The association sent a request to its members, and Fayetteville attorney Bob Estes offered to help. He recruited Plunkett. The lawyers began volunteering with the team in 2014-15. They remember the heartbreaking moment last spring when the team missed advancing to the state finals, losing to Parkview, they said.

Marshall remembers Estes saying the team wouldn't experience that feeling again and that he was determined the team would win this year.

The students returned this school year intent on vindicating Estes and Plunkett, Marshall said, even creating a rule in August: "Nationals is the only option."

"They've worked so hard," Marshall said.

Students spent hours working on mock trial, among other forms of debate, while also taking Advanced Placement courses, working part-time jobs and attending other school activities, they said.

For several weeks, senior Joel Edmonson has taken on a second identity as Sam Dacy, a witness in the case from the Idaho Department of Fish and Game, whose investigation of Bennett and her cattle ranch is a key piece of Zabala's case.

The role meant learning legal jargon and how to talk about a scientific investigation, he said.

"You have to embrace your witness to portray them correctly," Edmonson said. "It's fun."

Senior Anna Cook signed up for the mock trial team three years ago because she loves public speaking and debate. She's an attorney for the team this year, and she and the team spent some time figuring out how to overcome a damaging piece of information in Edmonson's character's testimony.

"You have to put so much thought into it," Cook said.

Benchoff portrays the cattle rancher when the team is on the defense. When the team is on the side of the plaintiff, she portrays the cattle rancher's estranged daughter, whose testimony supports the sheepherder. She has a different student attorney for each role, which helps her keep track, she said.

"When I'm the mom, I try to be as country as possible," Benchoff said. "I'll lean back. I'll kind of be a little saucy."

Benchoff describes the team as a family working together for three years for this moment.

"I can't let these people down," she said. "It's not about me anymore. It's about everyone I love here."

In his final notes for the team Tuesday, Estes stressed the importance of the opening statement. Estes reminded them of a study he sent them that found a majority of jurors make up their minds after opening arguments.

"If you don't win it in the opening, it's very difficult to recover," he said.

The Arkansas Bar Association provides volunteer attorneys to work with high school students across the state to prepare for the state mock trial competition, said Eddie H. Walker Jr., a Fort Smith lawyer who is president of the association.

"Community service is part of what the Bar Association believes is important," Walker said. "Getting students involved at an early age gives them an early understanding of what the legal process is about and ultimately makes them better citizens."

Metro on 05/14/2016

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