The Verdict: Mock Trial Team is a Winner

Haverford’s Mock Trial team has a lot to celebrate after its stellar showing at the American Mock Trial Association’s National Championship Tournament in April. Not only did the team place fifth in its division, securing its spot as one of the top 25 teams in the U.S., co-president Bella Salathé ’25 also emerged as the nation’s top collegiate lawyer.

What’s most impressive, though, is that Haverford’s team remains an entirely student-run affair. Among the 700 teams that compete in the association’s events, some are backed by law schools and paid coaches. Haverford’s team only receives guidance from alumni, including Ceci Cohen ’24, Jordan McGuffee ’18, and Isabella Canelo Gordon ’18, who attended nationals with the team.  

“We couldn’t have done it without them,” says Salathé’s fellow co-president, Isabella Otterbein ’26. 

This was the third appearance at nationals for the team, which boasts about 20 members, half of whom are aspiring attorneys. Its last run at the title was in 2023. Since then, the team has continued to build on its reputation for creativity and resourcefulness, including its unorthodox strategy of organizing its case around a single strong fact it discovers. 

“We spend a lot of time developing a theory that makes us feel confident and will put the rest of our team in a position to score well,” Otterbein, a political science major, says. “But we do go a little rogue. That makes it fun and forces the other team to adapt to our one-fact case.”

Such an unconventional style paid dividends for the team this year as it navigated the pressure and complexities of the championship. In regional competitions, collegiate attorneys and witnesses will typically work on one case from August through March. For nationals, however, the team was given just three weeks to prepare. At the championship, which was held in Cleveland this year, the team took on a wrongful death suit in which a man was killed after his tie was caught in a bowling alley’s machinery. 

In addition to its podium finish, Haverford was the runner-up for the SPAMTA award, which is presented to teams that exemplify kindness, respect, and civility. The award is something Otterbein and Salathé always strive for, and that approach has resulted in friendships with other teams—American University and University of Maryland, Baltimore County, in particular—that extend well beyond the courtroom. The bonds the team has formed, they say, set them apart from the bigger and better-resourced teams. 

“We make that part of our mission and team expectations,” Otterbein says. “We all agree that regardless of how we feel about the judging, we're always going to represent Haverford’s values of trust, concern, and respect.”

Salathé’s honor, the result of voting by the competition’s judges, is somewhat unexpected considering the rocky start to her mock trial career. Growing up in Japan, she didn’t have access to a team in high school. Seeing herself as an “argumentative person,” she joined Haverford’s team but struggled during her first year. 

“It was so weird because my first year at Haverford was mostly on Zoom, and I had no idea what was going on,” Salathé, a computer science major, recalls. “I think I cried at every single trial. I just felt constantly humiliated.”

Determined to be better, Salathé reached out to the team’s alumni supporters and continued to grow. This summer, before beginning her computer science graduate studies at the University of Pennsylvania, she’ll be the first Ford to represent the College at Trial by Combat, a one-on-one mock trial competition that pits the nation’s 16 best collegiate attorneys against one another. The competition, hosted by Drexel University and UCLA, will be held in Philadelphia in June. 

After completing her program at Penn, Salathé plans to pursue law school and to eventually work in law surrounding the tech sector.  

“At first, mock trial made me not want to be a lawyer, but then it kind of made me want to become a lawyer,” she says with a laugh. “But it’s also taught me how to speak about complicated tech in ways anyone can understand. It’s also helped me with job interviews. I am really grateful for what the team has done for me.”