Woodbridge Mock Trial won the 31st Annual Mock Trial Competition hosted by the California Rights Foundation of Orange County and will compete in the 31st Annual California Mock Trial Finals as the Champion Team of Orange County. The competition will be held in Sacramento in March.
“It is amazing that we won,” freshman rookie Sabrina Bui said. “We are definitely excited about moving on to state.”
Several Mock Trial students also received individual awards. Junior Patricia Serpa won an Outstanding Attorney award, sophomore Regina Zeng won an Outstanding Pretrial Attorney award and freshman Sabrina Bui won an award for representing the witness Sasha Fain.
Attorney Coaches Dave Outwater, Candace Briner and Peter Villar and Teacher Coaches Burr Robinson and Brooke Martin have guided the team since late September to prepare for the Mock Trial competitions.
“We are very humbled to have won the competition and the students have tried very hard to win this,” co-Teacher Coach Burr Robinson said. “At the state finals, we really want to give it 110 percent.”
The team, consisting of 28 members, practiced several times a week from late September to prepare for the competition held in the first two weeks of December. Mock Trial competed in four preliminary rounds and four final rounds, winning all eight trials. The team beat the opposing team of Tesoro High School in the finals competition on Dec. 17.
“It feels great to have won,” co-captain senior Jon Gumz said. “We sometimes have an attorney or two who struggles throughout the rounds, but this time we pulled it all together and managed to come on top. Our goal is to win state and I think we have a lot of room for improvement.”
The winner of the State Finals will represent California at the 2012 National High School Mock Trial competition in New Mexico this March.
