The High School Mock Trial season is in full swing. In just a few short weeks, nine teams will vie for the County title, and the honor of representing Marin in the State Championships in March, with an eye toward the National Competition in May. This year, the charges are human trafficking and false imprisonment: did the restaurant owner force the immigrant worker into modern-day slavery or was the owner just trying to help the worker stay in the country legally?

The Marin County Bar Association has sponsored the Marin County High School Mock Trial Competition for many years. Not only do we make a commitment to contribute financially to help run the county-wide program, most (if not all) of the attorney coaches for each team are proud MCBA members. Moreover, we supply "jurors" from the ranks of our membership for the two days of competition on January 28 and February 4 (breakfast and/or lunch provided).

In Marin, we are fortunate to have an extremely supportive bench which volunteers for the competition every year. Our students get the invaluable experience of having judges and bench officers preside over every round in actual Marin County courtrooms, but the competitive fate of the students is actually in our hands, because the attorneys sitting as jurors are the ones scoring the presentations. MCBA members who have served as scorers in the past have consistently described this interesting experience as fun, impressive, and rewarding.

The dedicated coaches devote months in this "second job" to mentor these rising stars. All the students, be they attorneys, witnesses, bailiffs, or court clerks spend a tremendous amount of time and energy learning about the legal system, refining their advocacy skills, and perhaps most importantly, practicing teamwork. Now, as they gear up for the competition, we encourage scorers to volunteer their time for at least one two-hour trial on one of the Competition Saturdays. This year, there is a new scoring system, so an additional one-hour training session is mandatory, to make sure we are all on the same page when it comes to honoring the work that these teams have put in through this program.

Next training session, January 10: Please email Luz Lopez at or Jonathan Lucha right away to volunteer!