Blog 11 & 12 - Mock Trial

Given what I’ve learnt about the expert witness role, court procedures, and of course what I’ve learnt during the mock trial, I would say the role of the expert witness is challenging and should not be taken lightly!

I think the most important part of being an expert witness is ensuring you know the report inside out. You would think this wouldn’t be too difficult considering many expert witnesses write the reports, however I discovered that there can be times where you can be called to be an expert witness even if you didn’t write the report. You can also write a report, and then be called to give evidence 6 or 7 years later, which in that case you would need to familiarise yourself with the content again to make sure you have a thorough understanding of what you’re defending in court.

 

Giving verbal evidence isn’t particularly straight forward. Obviously, there are barristers there who will try and force an answer out of you, and for some that can be quite intimidating and stress inducing, especially during cross examination. The challenge really is mastering the act of staying calm, staying on topic, and answering the questions that are asked. If you get off topic you run the risk of putting the whole case at risk, as being an expert witness is only a very small portion of the whole case. Ultimately the expert witness needs to remember they are there to serve the court, and not to get into an argument.

The Mock Trial gave students a chance to defend a report that wasn’t written by them, which isn’t particularly easy. One of the issues with the students giving evidence is that the majority of students didn’t really address the judge when answering the questions, and thus it was more of a conversation between the expert witness and the judge. When giving evidence, it’s pivotal that you do give your answer to the judge, because ultimately they are the ones that will decide on the facts, and they need to hear the facts from the witness.

I think general nervousness and anxiety caused many students to be flustered and challenged at times, but that was expected for the first time. Generally, the barristers, although intimidating at times, helped the students out if they felt like they didn’t know something or they were struggling. I also thought it was interesting when one of the barristers said that they form their conclusion first, and then work backwards to form the questions that they’ll ask the witness.

Coming back to the report itself, the Judge stated at the beginning of the mock trial that it’s not scary if you know what you’re talking about, and you know what you’re defending. What made the mock trial particularly challenging was the fact that students didn’t write the report and had to try to gain and understanding of the whole case in such a short period of time.