There are eight mock trial teams in Saratoga County alone, though two of them did drop out earlier this year for various reasons. Each school in the state receives a case, either criminal or civil, and competes with their respective schools through four rounds until an ultimate winner from the county is decided.
The case is the same for every school in the state, and each team has student attorneys, or advocates, and witnesses. Affidavits, or scripts, are provided for the witnesses and then the student lawyers have to present the questions for direct examinations and cross examinations, meaning teams can either play the plaintiff or the defense team.
“They shuffle the cases every year, so it goes back and forth between criminal and civil cases—last year was a criminal case where someone got hit with a crowbar,” said Maria Izzo, student advisor for the team and government teacher at SCC. “They even make the names for the witnesses gender neutral, so you can have a male or female act as a witness.”
Izzo said that the competition is a very “step-by-step process” and that the outcome isn’t just based on the verdict.
“You can lose the verdict but win the competition because it’s about the competition and the presentation of the material,” Izzo explained. “The verdict is great if you win it, but it’s really about style points—how your witnesses did, how your lawyers presented it, and the competition—so you have a number of points at the end and the team with the most points wins.”
Five years ago, the SCC mock trial team only had six students. This year, they have 14.
“We have three lawyers and six witnesses, and I have one senior who I call my assistant coach who basically acts as a lawyer helper,” Izzo said. “We broke it down to three groups and we had someone in each group acting as a ‘paralegal’ and acting as assistants to the lawyer of the group. Everybody had a role—they may not all be on the witness stand or a lawyer, but each person had something they contributed to the team.”
Also contributing to the team’s success were actual lawyers who act as advisors to the team: John Dormin, executive director of the Special Investigations Office at the NYS Department of Labor, and Kevin Kortright, District Attorney of Washington County.
“As an experienced trial lawyer with over 25 years of practice, I am astonished at the skill, poise and intelligence of the students I am privileged to work with at Saratoga Central Catholic’s mock trial program,” Dormin said. “They work incredibly hard, yet have fun with presenting these cases before real judges in real courtrooms. Our students also demonstrate something that is sometimes lacking in our justice system: respect and kindness toward their adversaries that shines through when they present their case.”
Izzo said the lawyers help the students present their cases in true legal fashion, using the right terms.
“The lawyers help with the technicality of everything,” Izzo said. “They help us put the complaint into action and say, ‘This is the complaint and this is how we address the defense and the plaintiff.’
We meet with the lawyers weekly, but we practice about three times a week. My role is to help get the witnesses ready and go over their directs over and over again, and I help them revise their questions and help with the overall flow of everything.”
Izzo said the team won by a narrow margin at the regional competition, beating out Pottsdam to move on to the state finals in Albany May 20.
“[State Supreme Court] Judge Thomas D. Nolan Jr. was the judge at regionals and he came in after the case was over and gave the kids the kudos they so well deserve, and some pointers,” Izzo said. “We’re all holding our breath because you just want to hear the verdict, and finally he said, ‘It’s a very close one—I’m going to make half the room happy and half the room sad today,’ and then he said we won by two points. We were elated and very surprised, because [Pottsdam] was a very good team, but we had a very slight edge on them—two points is extremely close and it could have gone the other way, but it went our way.”
Now the students are enjoying their time together as they prepare for the top level of the competition, Izzo said.
“They just enjoy the camaraderie—they get along so well and they’re friends—if we have a 3 o clock practice they’ll go out and get a coffee together or sometimes they’ll go out to dinner together,” Izzo said. “They’re a very close group and work very well together so they’re having a blast. They’re having so much fun and the fact that they’re so dedicated makes it easy for me because they’re very self-motivated.”
Dormin added that a lot of the team’s success is owed to Izzo, and that no matter the outcome of the mock trial, he thinks the students will be very successful in life.
“A large share of their success belongs to [Izzo], who inspires them to achievement in this competition with integrity, not sharp practices,” Dormin said. “I am so proud to have worked with these students over the years, and they will be leaders on whatever path they choose in life.”
