After making a strong showing in three Preliminary Rounds, the DU Team advanced to the Semifinal Rounds, meaning they were one of the top 27 performing out of 72 teams participating.  Third-year law student Kristin Butler was awarded Best Oralist in one of the Preliminary Rounds.  Building off of last year’s success, this marks the third time in DU’s history of competing that the team has qualified for the Semifinals.

The Pace competition is recognized as the preeminent environmental law moot in the United States.  It begins each year in October when a problem is distributed focusing on statutory and constitutional issues in the context of federal environmental litigation.  Student teams must submit a brief with no outside assistance and present oral argument for each of three different parties in the problem.

The members of DU’s team were selected as the three highest-scoring participants in the DU Environmental Law Moot Court Competition, held in September 2012.  The DU Team prepared an outstanding brief covering a range of disputed issues in a Clean Water Act suit.  Beginning in January, the team, with the help of coach Kelly Davis, former Pace competitors, and law students and faculty, prepared for oral argument.

Congratulations to team members Kristin Butler, Jennifer Gilbert-Eggleston, Jessica Zaegel, and coach Kelly Davis on a job well done!

Last year The Advocacy Department, having been never previously bestowed a position in the rankings, burst on to the national scene with an 11^th Place ranking.

Jumping this year to such an esteemed position of 9^th Place was met with a collective cheer from the school  It was further validation of the law school’s success as it surges ahead, under the direction of Dean Marty Katz and Academic Dean Fred Cheever, to effectively teach professional skills to its students who will one day “Take the Oath.”

In its short existence, The Advocacy Department has seen its National Trial Team advance to The National Championships three of the last four years, won the National Top Gun Championship, and advanced to the National Semifinals in the National Trial Competition last year.   Additionally, its moot-based teams (Vis, Jessup, Environmental, ABA) continue to excel in their respective arenas as well. This year, the Department’s Jessup International Moot Court Team advanced to Worlds, in Washington, D.C.  For the 2^nd year in a row, the Department’s Vis International Arbitration Moot Court Team was crowned Champions of the Shanghai Moot Court Competition.

These achievements are in addition to the department’s establishment of innovative courses and programs such as “The Mentor’s Practicum”, “The Instructor’s Practicum”, a summer “Advocacy Academy” to help area high school students develop their critical thinking skills and professional communication skills, and most of all, a series of lab-based courses, known as the “Day One” series (Day 1 Civil, Day 1 Criminal, Day 1 Domestic), which are designed to escort law school students through every major pleading, discovery, and dispositional stage in the life of a case.

The most exciting aspect is, the department is still in its beginning stages of it development, with much more growth and creativity to follow. As the department’s director, David Schott, was quoted to say, “We are so excited and pleased having received validation from US News for a second consecutive year.  We are a small department, but we are very thankful for all of the students, faculty, adjuncts, and alumni, who are devoting their time, energy and creativity. As we like to say, so far everything we’ve accomplished has been just ‘one small step for humankind, but one giant leap for people who like to argue’.”

The Daniel S. Hoffman Trial Advocacy Competition is the premier mock trial competition for upper classmen. 17 teams competed on Friday evening and Saturday. The top 8 teams advanced to Sunday morning, and the top 4 teams to Sunday afternoon.

Over the weekend, teams were judged y practicing attorneys from around Denver, receiving a combination of scores and verbal comments to improve their skills. The teams truly put their best feet forward and the judging attorneys emerged impressed by the talent that was put on display.

Special thanks also go out to ADA Brad Moloney for teaching the six week course geared to teaching students important trial techniques through the context of the Hoffman Cup problem.

Special thanks as well to our esteemed panel of judges for the final round. From left to right: Professor David Schott, Chris Wilcox, Magistrate Judge Craig Shaffer, Julie Selsberg, Cole Wist, Diana Sada and Chris Esser (Champions), Judge Ruben Hernandez, Professor Tamara Kuennen

The Motions Competition at the University of Denver Sturm College of Law was created in 2007 by Ms. Ashley Pollock and other members of the Moot Court Board, and was named in honor of the late Judge Phillip S. Figa in 2008, following Judge Figa’s untimely passing.  The competition was created to test students’ oral advocacy and critical thinking skills by asking students to argue in support of or in opposition to a Motion before local attorneys and judges.

In furtherance of the University’s mission to graduate practice-ready law students, this year, the Moot Court Board collaborated with Professor K.K. DuVivier to produce a competition which featured a Civil Procedure motion based on a real case pending before the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, Dish Network L.L.C. v. ABC, Inc. (S.D.  N.Y. 2012)(Civil Action No. 12 Civ. 4155(LTS)(KNF)).  With permission of the document authors, Professor DuVivier adapted the problem materials from pleadings in the case to create a problem that was interesting to competition judges, challenging for upper-level students, and manageable for first year Civil Procedure students.

Competitors were presented with 67 pages of pleadings and were invited to attend a primer lecture by Professor DuVivier to help them understand the problem issues and to instruct them on proper courtroom etiquette.  Student competitors were instructed to prepare both sides of the case to argue the following Civil Procedure issues in support or in opposition to a motion filed by the defendant: (1) the purpose and appropriateness of a declaratory judgment under 28 U.S.C. § 2201 and (2) venue, including the role of a forum selection clause in controlling venue.  Undaunted by this incredible challenge, twenty first and second year law students competed in several grueling rounds of mock Motions arguments before local attorneys and judges on Saturday, September 22, 2012.

Over thirty local practitioners and judges were in attendance to judge this competition and many expressed amazement at the professionalism and quality of arguments demonstrated by the untenured student competitors.  As one local practitioner noted, competitions like this are largely responsible for the Sturm College of Law’s growing reputation for producing practice-ready graduates.  The final round was judged by Judge Robert E. Blackburn of the United States District Court for the District of Colorado, Magistrate Judge Boyd N. Boland of the United States District Court for the District of Colorado, Magistrate Judge Kristen L. Mix from the United States District Court for the District of Colorado, Magistrate Judge Ruben Hernandez of the Denver Probate Court, and Ms. Candace Figa, a partner at the law firm of Burns, Figa, & Will.

Under rapid-fire questioning by this panel of esteemed judges and practitioners, the finalist competitors, Mr. Levi Price and Mr. Nicholas Santucci, demonstrated professionalism, creativity, and zealous advocacy in the presentation of their respective arguments.  The final round was conducted in front of a packed house of practitioners, professors, and law students at the University of Denver Sturm College of Law.  In a unanimous decision by the judges, Mr. Levi Price was declared the winner and Mr. Nicholas Santucci was declared the runner-up of this competition.  The Moot Court Board applauds each of the student competitors and would like to thank the professors, practitioners, and judges who selflessly volunteered their time to provide the students with this invaluable experiential learning experience and we sincerely hope to see this competition grow in popularity in future academic years.

“A wonderful performance.”  Judge Boyd N. Boland

“Exemplary advocacy.”  Judge Robert E. Blackburn

“I am in awe of the job you did today.”  Judge Kristen L. Mix

Click Here To Watch The Motions Competition

Third year law school student Chris Wilcox stood before former U.S. Solicitor General Kenneth Starr, waiting with bated-breath for the presiding judge’s next words. 

Mr. Wilcox, a member of the University of Denver Sturm College of Law’s National Trial Team, was in Texas this past spring, competing in the Top Gun National Mock Trial Championships.   As the name implies, Top Gun gathers the country’s best law student advocates to compete in the year’s climactic trial advocacy tournament.

Being a graduating third year law school student, this was Mr. Wilcox’s final tournament in which he could compete.   His reputation was that of a very hardworking student with much talent, but with great humility.  But being from the small town of Miles City, Montana, he was never one to celebrate, and rarely smiled at his achievements.  Mr. Wilcox himself had been named Best Orator two years in a row in DU Law’s Hoffman Cup, named after DU Law’s late, esteemed alumnus and former Dean, Daniel Hoffman.  He and his teammates, while having come close to winning tournaments, had never prevailed, and certainly had never won a national championship.  So standing in the Championship Round of Top Gun, opposite the team from Yale Law School, and this being the sixth round in two days, Mr. Wilcox was both invigorated and enervated.

Top Gun is a tournament like no other.   It is the most arduous of all tournaments in the nation.  Like most trial advocacy tournaments, in each round the advocates present their cases before a jury of three scoring jurors and a presiding judge.  The advocates are scored on their application of the Federal Rules of Evidence, the logical cohesiveness of their case theory, theme and thesis, and the prowess they exhibit “in the well” in examining witnesses, presenting evidence, objecting, and all things trial.

What makes Top Gun definitively unique, aside from the fact that it attracts the best teams in the country, is that the case itself is not released until twenty four hours before the competitors must present the case for trial.  There are six witnesses to start, with new witnesses and live depositions being added as the rounds progress.  And, only the competitor and one coach per school may read and develop the case.   There is no other outside help or assistance.

“Educationally, it’s a very effective learning forum.  It closely emulates the practical aspects of trial work and readies a student for trial work,”  said David Schott, Director of The Advocacy Department at DU Law, and the coach who attended Top Gun this year with Mr. Wilcox.  “It is very similar to the processes and pressures that Assistant D.A.’s and P.D.’s experience.  The advocates and their coaches have less than a day to prepare their case.  The advocates meet their witnesses just a few minutes before trial.  They are advocating predominantly ‘on their feet’.”

One more little twist is the advocates and coaches do not know which side of the case their school will be required to present in any given round.  Thus they only have twenty four hours to prepare both sides of the case for trial.   This is where the tournment actually gets grueling.   The competitor and lone coach essentially lock themselves into a room for eighteen hours or so, and begin analyzing both sides of the case, and outlining cogent approaches to each side.

Top Gun is the brainchild of Professors Jerry Powell and his colleagues in the trial advocacy department at Baylor Law School.  Baylor is home to one of the top five Trial Advocacy Department’s in the country.  (The Advocacy Department at DU Law, having never been ranked previously in the school’s history, catapulted to 11^th place this year.)  Professor Powell and his team purposely make the tournament a tough experience to test not only the critical thinking skills that are learned in the first year of law school, but to add the real world pressures and practices too.   Most observers resoundingly agree that Baylor has succeeded in their mission.

With the nation’s law schools realizing they have to forge a revised avenue to their century-old doctrinal approach to law school education, and focus more on professional skills, Top Gun is “applied critical thinking” at its best.   A student who can succeed in Top Gun is a student who is ready.   They are ready to step into a courtroom and ready to advocate at a high level.

“As I stood there before Judge Starr, all I could think was, ‘This is it.’”, reflected Mr. Wilcox, “This was everything I had worked for, everything I had been taught.  This is what all the late nights and long hours were about that my wife Kate had endured with me.”

Judge Starr’s next words were, “The 2012 Top Gun National Champion is…The University of Denver.”

Applause and cheers erupted throughout the courtroom.

…If one looked closely, a small smile could be seen creeping over Mr. Wilcox’s face.   He is ready.

DU had never previously placed in the Top 12 at Nationals.  This year, in Austin, all of that changed.  At Nationals, Wilcox and Opfer continued their march.  They advanced through the three qualifying National rounds with a perfect 3-0 record, and also through the Quarterfinals (4-0) – only dropping  1 ballot through all of it.  It was finally in the Semifinals that Wilcox and Opfer lost in a split-ballot decision to the trial team from Baylor’s law school (a Top 5 Advocacy Program in the U.S.), thus placing DU in the Top 3 schools at Nationals.  Congratulations to both Chris and Ashley on a wonderful law school trial advocacy career.

The Willem C. Vis International Commercial Arbitration Moot is an annual international commercial arbitration simulation involving a dispute over an international sale of goods. The Moot Shanghai is a Vis Moot “Pre-Moot” held in Shanghai, China. It was attended by twenty teams, including four teams in a unique “e-moot” format via special video conferencing technology. The University of Denver competed against City University of Hong Kong by e-moot from the Shanghai Arbitration Commission facilities. The DU Vis Moot team also competes in the Vis (East) Moot in Hong Kong China, the Belgrade Vis Pre-Moot, and the main Vis Moot in Vienna, Austria. The 2011-2012 DU Vis Moot Team consists of team members Maureen Weiland, Kaitlin Fox, Emily Bloedel, Stephanie Foote, Chris Rogers, and Ken Hayes. The team coaches consist of adjunct professor Todd Wells, Coren Hinkle, Matt Hofmeister, Kevin Walsh, and Ted Gleason. For more information about the DU Vis Moot Team, contact Todd Wells at todd.wells@gleasonwells.com.

This year’s team members were: John Gaudette (3L), Brianna Evans, Victoria Kelley, Wesley Fry, and William Kent (all 2Ls). The Coaches were Megan Matthews and John Powell. They, unfortunately, lost in a split panel to University of Hawaii in the round which determined which team would advance to the International Rounds. Their Applicant written brief had the highest points in the region and their combined written briefs scored 7th in the Region. Out of 96 oralists, 3 of our oralists scored the 12th place, 18th place, and 20th place rankings. John Gaudette is graduating this year, but the rest of the team members are returning and the team is looking for one new member for next year.  The team plans to advance to the International Rounds next year!