Third-Year Students Win Law School Trial Competition

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. - Third-year students Gina Gilmore of Texas City, Texas, and Michael McGhee of El Dorado, Ark., won the final round of the University of Arkansas School of Law William H. Sutton Barristers' Union Trial Competition held Oct. 1, 2004, in the Leflar Law Center courtroom.

The Gilmore-McGhee team defeated third-year students Emily Moss of Fayetteville and Brad Runyon of Hot Springs, Ark., in the final of the two-week event that featured 32 two-person teams of second- and third-year law students from the University of Arkansas competing in a tournament-style trial competition.

Along with the final two teams, semifinal participants included the teams of third-year students David Dixon of Walnut Ridge, Ark., and Ben Wulff of Eureka Springs, Ark., and second-year students Leon Jones of Pine Bluff, Ark., and Steven Moses of Arlington, Texas.

The final round was argued before Don R. Elliott Jr. of Odom & Elliott Law Firm and Jennifer Hendren and Ken Shemin of Shemin and Hendren, all of Fayetteville.

Trial competition scholarships for the 2004 event were provided to the finalists by Bobby Lee Odom ('70), Don R. Elliott Jr. ('78), Russell B. Winburn ('87), J. Timothy Smith ('91) and Conrad T. Odom ('91) of Odom & Elliott.

The competition involved teams working with a previously drafted record, presenting an opening statement, examining and cross-examining witnesses, and giving closing arguments in a mock trial setting.

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Frankie Frisco, communications coordinator, School of Law, (479) 575-6111, ffrisco@uark.edu