Not just beating around the bush

Gary Moskowitz

HILLSIDE DISTRICT -- Getting over the awkwardness and anxiety of

public speaking required to participate in high school mock trials is

only the half of it.

Mera Applegate, the only sophomore trial attorney on Burbank High

School’s Law Dogs Mock Trial Team, also had to learn how to study a case

inside and out so she could answer any question a judge fired at her.

“At one night’s practice, I was so close to just walking off the

team,” said Applegate, 15. “But with coaching, I reached a turning point

and realized I could do it. Before that, I was just sort of beating

around the bush.”

Applegate is one of 21 Burbank High students in the school’s mock

trial club, nine of whom participate in competitions by assuming the

roles of attorneys and witnesses and trying cases provided by the

California Mock Trial Program.

The Burbank High team recently won preliminary Los Angeles County

competition rounds and will progress to the Mock Trial Championship

Tournament for the third straight year, going up against 16 other schools in the county.

The team has been meeting three times each week at co-coach Dave

Wasserman’s home since September, debating the intricate details of an

ecoterrorism case and scribbling pages of notes on yellow legal pads in

hopes of advancing to the Nov. 29 finals in San Jose.

“I think our practices are harder than the actual games,” Wasserman

said. “This is the stuff to remember. You become a family just like any

other high school group.”