Native Son Essay: Mock Trial

My class and I did a mock trial mirroring the one from Native Son, written by Richard Wright. The class was divided between the prosecution, jury, defense and the judge. We did this case to interpret the book’s case in our own reality.
During the mock trial, both sides introduced their claims. The prosecuting side argued that Bigger should be sentenced to death and the defense side argued that Bigger acted upon insanity and should be put in rehabilitation. Each side brought up a witness and each witness got questioned from both parties. Prosecution went up first, then defense. After all the questioning of the witnesses, both sides got to close with their conclusions. The overall case went very well. Each side did a great job, this including my opponents. Obviously I didn’t want my opponents to do well, but they did a very great job. Each witness had played their roles very well and looked prepared when coming up to the stand. The prosecuting team’s lawyers, were as well, great at their roles. They asked questions that provoked my defense side’s witnesses, but we did well in answering them. Coming to this point, was easy and fun to do.
The preparation for this trial was enjoyable. All my group members knew the importance in making a good case and it was not hard to join together to do so. Our lawyers took good care of each of their witnesses and
The jury chose to Bigger Thomas as guilty with many charges but one was rape. I was prepared to hear “guilty” but not on rape. During the debate they did not prove the prosecution did not prove that Bigger raped Mary. In fact it was not even brought up until a defense lawyer argued for it. I’m fine with the outcome but not with that charge. I feel as though the jury already had preconceived bias which may have affected the case’s outcome. I am not bitter about the outcome, but I believe it should have been more thought