Jury Duty Event Details

Jury Duty

This tournament is the first in which this event is being held. It came about after discussion with some coaches at the Farmington tournament last year, and hours of thought from the Farmington coach (if you know both coaches, you can probably assume which one). Much of the format was thought up after watching 12 Angry Men.

Overview: Competitors will take on the role of jurors in a court case during deliberations, striving to deliver a unanimous verdict.

Preparation: Prior to the tournament, students need to study the case file. Yes, it is just an old Mock Trial case.

The Round: Each round will be about 1 hour and will consist of 12 competitors (or however close to that we can get).

At the beginning of the round: The round will begin with each student receiving a slip of paper assigning them to a side- Guilty or Innocent. They will go around the table and verbally state what verdict they are representing. While stating their side, they can also make a 15 second appeal to why they should be the Foreman. Once all competitors have spoken, the judge will choose a student to act as Foreman.

Unfolding of the round: Competitors will then take turns arguing for their side of the verdict, trying to convince the other side to join them on their side through the use of evidence from the trial and logical arguments. At any point competitors can call for a vote, at which point the Foreman must agree to the vote before proceeding with a verbal or secret (paper) vote.

At the end of the round: By the end of the round, the jury must come to a unanimous decision. If not, the jury is hung and a mistrial is called.

How ratings and points work: Students will receive points based on the following. Those points directly correlate to speaker points and will be used to rank the competitors at the end of the round.

Speaking: competitors are expected to speak. This is not like Congress where they get up and give formulated speeches, but rather they are speaking up to rebut other people's points, views, and ascertains. Each speech should be no longer than 1 minute but could be as brief as 5 seconds. The judge will not be keeping track of each individual speech but will be keeping track of points made and evidence used in those speeches. Competitors are expected to be respectful, eloquent, organized, and persuasive. This is where the majority of points come from.

Evidence: competitors are expected to use evidence from the trial. They may also use basic knowledge and logic in their arguments but should really lean on the evidence that was provided from the trial.

Persuasion: the side (guilty/not guilty) that ends up with the verdict they want will receive points for persuasion.

Hung Jury: If a decision is not reached by the end of the trial, every competitor will lose points.

Where most of the points come from giving speeches, and students get extra points for not caving to the other side, students are incentivized to keep the debate going for the whole allotted time. But they must be careful to not run out of time before they can all agree on a verdict; else they all lose points.

Round to Round: At this tournament there will be 2 rounds, with each being independent from the other (in other words, it starts over in the second round).