Around 0720 on Saturday 9th March, our Springwood Mock Trials Team arrived at school ready to take part in the first round of the Magistrates Mock Trial competition in Peterborough. As in the past, we always use the minibus trip there as an extra rehearsal to practise with those that we will work with in court.

Naturally everyone was nervous and our levels of nerves began to rise as we approached Peterborough Court.

We arrived with time to spare, which allowed us time to practise in a court room before the other schools got there. After a while our parents started arriving, alongside Mr Johnson who had come to watch for the first time. The other competitors shortly arrived and we had to introduce ourselves and swap team genders for the witness characters that we had all been practising to prevent a loss of marks.

The time came for our first round out of two. The team never perform together because it would mean cross-examining people from the same team, which wouldn’t work. Therefore, every team that takes part is split into two; Prosecution and defence.

Our defence side of the team were competing first against Prince William High School. Each side of our teams consists of two lawyers, two witnesses, three magistrates and a member of court staff. The prosecution half of our team waited outside the courtrooms while the defence were up and used the extra time to practise (and to get more nervous!)

When our team’s courtroom door opened, we all rushed in to find out how they had done. They had finished performing and were just awaiting the guilty or not guilty verdict which meant a bit of a breather for everyone! Many handshakes and high fives were exchanged between the two sides of our team and with the competing school.

After that first round it was time for the defence team to relax as their job were done, and was turn for the prosecution to go up against Peele Community College. I was part of the prosecution team and we waited nervously outside the courtroom with sweaty hands and shaking knees before taking our places.

We did our best, let out a sigh of relief and all ate our lunch. We received lots of lovely comments from the other schools and their students, and we knew that whatever the result, that we had tried our best.

The Judges gathered all schools downstairs in the court and gave a speech and certificates to each school. Then it was time to announce the winner. “And the winners of the 2019 Magistrates Mock Trial are!…. Springwood High School!!!” A huge shout out and applause erupted and we were all ecstatic.

It was a great experience for us, and it means that now we move on to round 2, the regional heat in Mansfield on the 18th of May. We will receive the case for this on the day that we break up for Easter holidays, so we are all preparing to come in over Easter to practise!

One final highlight of the day was that Mr Johnson promised that he would show us how he dabbed after having to produce a quick dance move on a recent course he went on. As you can imagine, we all held him to his promise, and it finished the day off with more fun and laughter! Unfortunately we don’t have any photos of that part to share though!

A celebratory McDonalds on the way home made the day even more fun, and now we await the next case for the next lot of hard work!

Jannis