Kids hold mock trial at courthouse

DeKalb's Classical Conversation mock trial team members (from left) Joel Dik, 13, Isaac Chapman, 15, and Kristen Nielsen, 13, talk amongst themselves Wednesday during their mock murder trial against the Freeport team at the DeKalb County courthouse in Sycamore.

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SYCAMORE – Barbara Barrett wasn’t sure what to do. She was sure she had never had a career as an actress, but the prosecuting attorney questioning her in her husband’s murder was insisting that she had.

“I didn’t know what to do with those questions,” Ellyn Heegaard, the 14-year-old Sycamore resident portraying “Barbara,” said afterward.

Ellyn and 19 other home-schooled students from the DeKalb and Freeport areas participated in a mock trial Wednesday at the DeKalb County courthouse. Local attorney James Davidson played the role of the judge, and all the other roles – attorneys, witnesses, bailiffs, jurors and defendant – were played by students ranging from 13-17 years old.

The students are members of Classical Conversations, a network of home schools that provides weekly academic meetings to supplement the students’ lessons. The students at Wednesday’s event were in Challenge B, the level for students in grades 7-12. There were seven students in the Freeport group, which prosecuted the case, and 12 in the DeKalb group, which portrayed the defense. Classical Conversations state manager Kim Cromer expects to do next year’s mock trial tournament-style, since there should be several more Challenge B groups in the state by then.

“We do the mock trial for them to practice their critical thinking skills and presentation skills,” Cromer, of DeKalb, said. “Some of these kids have never spoken before more than 10 people.”

They spoke before a packed courtroom Wednesday. The DeKalb County courthouse “bent over backward” to accommodate the group, Cromer said, noting that Presiding Judge Kurt Klein was holding court in a different courtroom than usual that afternoon so the group could use the largest and most opulent courtroom for its exercise.

Other than the snag in both sides knowing the defendant’s back story, the trial flowed relatively smoothly. The students have been practicing for it all semester, Cromer said, and many of the students in the DeKalb group had made previous visits to the courthouse to sit in on actual trials.

“It’s been really amazing,” said 13-year-old Kirsten Nielsen of Waterman, who portrayed one of the defense attorneys.

“We’ve seen this courtroom and these procedures before, so it’s really fun to experience it ourselves and be in it. ...You felt like you were actually running the case,” Nielsen said.

Some of the students knew procedures so well, when Davidson tried to excuse McKenzie Cromer, 13, of DeKalb, from the witness stand, she politely corrected him because she hadn’t been cross-examined yet.

“Sorry, folks, I’ve never done this before,” Davidson cracked from the bench. “In fact, there are judges rolling over in their graves because I’m up here.”

McKenzie said she had been prepared for the exercise not only through the hours of practice but through her experiences in debate competitions.

“It’s pretty awesome,” she said. “Different people bring up different arguments, like they do in debate, but that keeps it fun and interesting.”

In the trial, Barbara Barrett has been charged with murdering her husband of 10 years. Barrett and a psychologist testified for the defense that the act was the result of years of abuse, while the prosecution called a police officer and the family housekeeper to testify that Barrett was never abused.

“I wasn’t sure how I could do with the drama,” Ellyn said of her role as defendant. “I was surprised, when we started, how I was feeling it more than I had been.”