A look inside Sonoma Valley High’s mock trial team

Sonoma Valley High School’s Mock Trial team has competed almost every week throughout the winter, including five matches at the Napa Courthouse against Cardinal Newman, Napa High, Vintage High, Justin Siena and New Tech – and SVHS came out in first place with the highest percentage of overall points. Last month, the team even competed in the State Championship in Sacramento. 

“For me, it is amazing to see how far the students come in their understanding and ownership of complicated material from October to February and even more amazing to see them exponentially improve each week in February during the local competition,” said volunteer attorney coach Kathy Richards.  

Helping out the team’s lead volunteer coach Janet Hansen this year as attorney coaches are Richards, who recently retired from practicing family law and dependency law in San Francisco; Dave Diamond, an attorney with a practice in Napa; practicing attorney Valerie Pistole; and graduate Jessica Guest, a third-year law student.

“This is the best group of attorney coaches I have worked with,” said Hansen.

Another big help to the team has been the support it has received from the Sonoma Valley Rotary Club and from the SVHS Boosters Club. “Mock Trial has no school budget,” said Hansen. “Students raise money for registration, but for any kind of travel or post-season involvement we rely on the support of our sponsors.”

Now in its 16th year, SVHS’s mock trial team has produced many debaters who have gone on to compete in college including Delaney Gold-Diamond, who now competes for University of Chicago and Guest, who competed for UC Santa Barbara and now competes for her law school, Hastings.

“We have other former competitors who are attorneys now,” said Hansen.