Mock Trial: Attorneys
Attorneys are paid to take a legal matter and using their knowledge of the law, figure out how best to deal with a legal matter then to do so. This means that attorneys will either try to settle outside of court or they will go to court. The difference between a real attorney and a Mock Trial attorney is that in Mock Trial you don’t have the chance to settle outside of court, and you don’t get paid for your work.
The group of attorney is the backbone of any Mock Trial team. I am not trying to say that the attorneys are more important than the witnesses, but it is critical to have attorneys that are articulate and prepared because an attorney is always being scored by the judges. Attorney scores account for about sixty-six percent of the total team score, however they only comprise fifty percent of the team. Each team is allowed to have either three or four attorneys on a team. No matter how many attorneys you choose to have, they are in charge of the opening statement, the direct examination of your teams three witnesses, the objections during your witnesses cross examinations, the objections during the direct of the other teams three witnesses, the cross-examination of the other side witnesses, and the closing statements.
The job of an attorney varies if the legal matter is civil or criminal, and if they are on the side of the defense or the plaintiff/prosecution. However, the basic job of an attorney is to present the judges with why they think their side is right, then to ask questions which prove their theory and disproves to other teams theory. This means that any attorney must be prepared with questions and case theory. They must know what they need from every single witness and how to get them to respond to the questions with the answers you want. This can be hard with the other teams witnesses, because these witnesses try to not answer the way you want them to while not lying. The best benefit to being an attorney is that you get notes. While asking your questions you can read what your want to say next, you can read a witness statement to double-check if the witness is staying with in the case book, and if the witness lies you can impeach them and discredit them.
The real fun of being an attorney is when you are able to make an opposing witness say something that hurts their case and helps your our case, and the fact that you get to wear suits.
