Members of Revere High School’s Mock Trial team participated in a district competition battling opposing high school teams in legal arguments at the Summit County Common Pleas Court.

The students started meeting in September. In the beginning of October, the team received their case for the year. Upon the case’s arrival, the team prepared for the next four months. Friery oversees the club along with Tom Kelley, the team’s legal adviser. The students meet two days a week, Tuesday and Friday. However, Friery keeps her room open every day for the members after school. In addition, Kelley put in many hours and opened his home to the students so they could practice there. Friery explained their role with helping the students with the case.

“They get 200 pages of legal documents. We make sure they get the concepts. It isn’t scripted. It’s on them to come up with questions and strategies all on their own. We give them suggestions once they have it done,” Friery said.

The Revere club includes Aria Alexander, Travis Altman, Trevena Anton, Olivia Detzel, Daniel Fioritto, Megan Gilroy, Jenny Glowe, Erik Godard, Nicole Henry, Jessica Hill, Danielle Kakish, Aaron Kelley, Laura Leventhal, Maddie Newingham, Abbey Niemi, Matt Palla, Garrison Peters, Cecilia Salem, Michael Salopek and Devin Seay. Ellen Friery, the Mock Trial adviser and social studies teacher, split the students into a blue team and a red team. The blue and red teams each consisted of one defense group and one plaintiff group.

The teams appeared before various Summit county judges and attorneys on Friday, January 31 to argue four cases. All the schools randomly selected their opponents. The defense trials were held in the morning. Revere’s red defense battled Coventry’s plaintiffs at 8:30 am. Fioritto and Alexander were the defense attorneys while Salopek and Hill portrayed witnesses. Niemi kept time as the bailiff. The team won their trial, and Fioritto was awarded Outstanding Attorney in the case. Fioritto, a RHS senior, discussed the trial.

“This year’s case was pretty unique. Normally, the prosecution has the burden of proof so the defense really doesn’t need to prove anything. They just explain why the prosecution is wrong. This year was different in that both the defense and plaintiff were filing for injunctive relief (a restraining order), so we both had to prove why our motion should be passed while simultaneously explaining why the opposing counsel’s motion should be denied,” Fioritto said.

Revere also pulled Hoban twice when selecting their opponents for the legal arguments. Hoban resided as the number one school in the district. Revere’s blue defense and blue plaintiff lost their trials; however, their points contributed to Revere’s overall win. Gilroy was presented with the Best Witness award in her case against Hoban. Fioritto explained the challenges these two teams faced.

“Different schools are at different levels. Hoban for example, almost always wins and have many well prepared teams. Our other teams faced Hoban both in the morning and in the afternoon and were barely beat by them. When facing a team like Hoban, it can be stressful because you know that they are going to be bring their A game so you need to do the same,” Fioritto said.

To move on to regionals, both the red defense and red plaintiff needed to win their cases. The red plaintiff team battled Medina Buckeye High School at 1 pm. The trial resulted in a victory for Revere. Godard was awarded Outstanding Attorney in the case while Altman was named Outstanding Witness in the case. The win earned Revere’s red team a spot in regionals. Altman gave his initial reactions to being crossed by the opposing counsel and his team’s attitude after the case.

“Once I got going, I was okay. I was super nervous before and I was shaking. I focused while answering, but their cross was weak. You have to answer the questions carefully. You have to make yourself look good. The judges critiqued us better. After the trial, my team was excited because they thought we were going to win,” Altman said.

Revere placed first overall in the district competition and took home the largest trophy. The blue team will help the red team prepare for regionals. Friery explained the next round in the competition.

“We move on with the same case. We are fine-tuning what we learned at districts to make it better for regionals,” Friery said.

The team competed at Regionals on Friday, February 21. They faced two schools, and did not advance to States in Columbus. Alexander and Detzel both received Outstanding Attorney Award during the Regional competition.