The Elon Mock Trial program will compete against 22 other teams from 15 universities in the American Mock Trial Association Regional Tournament in Orlando, Florida on February, 20-22, 2009. Fresh off of their 5th place finish in the Chapel Hill Regional two weeks ago, Elon’s second mock trial team will try to earn Elon another bid to the AMTA Championship Series. Elon’s team consists of seven students from all majors and departments. This will be the fifth tournament of the season for Elon Mock Trial.
Among the teams in competition will be the University of Central Florida, Georgia Tech, the University of Florida and Florida State University. Fellow Southern Conference schools Furman University and the College of Charleston will also be in attendance.
Elon Mock Trial looks to carry forward the momentum from Chapel Hill and earn a second bid to the Championship Series for the first time in the teams history. Elon Mock Trial has been competing in AMTA since 2003. The team has been preparing since the beginning of the academic year, meeting two and three times a week for more two hours at a time. The team uses the same case all year. The case this year is a defamation suit between a candidate for governor, Drew Walton in the ficticious state of Midlands and the Blitz News Network (BNN). BNN accused Walton of murder live on national tv. Walton subsequently lost the election and has now filed suit for damages.
The Elon students that will be competing this weekend at the Seminole County Justice Center are: Amanda Morrissey ’10, Robert Brafford ’11, Amelie Busch ’11, Kristen DelForge ’11, Micahel Gross, ’12, Sara Kaplan ’12 and Evan Glover ’12.
The team is coached and accompanied by William Warihay, a second year law student at Elon University School of Law, and Matrice Williams, an adjunct political science professor.
For more information on Elon Mock Trial, please visit the web site listed to the right of this page.