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Appellate Moot Court Team Heads to England After Top Finish

February 21, 2018 3:11 AM

A Tulane appellate moot court team’s outstanding performance has earned it the right to compete internationally at Oxford University in England.The Tulane team, composed of Peter Hull, Catherine Nunez, and Lauren Starnes, all third-year students and veteran moot court advocates, finished in second place in the finals of the Americas Regional round for the Price Media Law competition at Cardozo Law School in New York City. Because of the top finish, the team now advances to the International Round which will take place at Oxford in early April. “We won all three of our preliminary rounds, as well as our semi-final round. I am so proud of our Veterans team and I look forward to even more success at Oxford as well as for other appellate teams,” said Starnes.In the next round, the team will be competing against 39 others from all over the world, including Europe, Asia and Africa.“The oral advocacy skills I’m learning are really going to be helpful to me in my career,” said Starnes. “The idea that you have to research an area of law that you know nothing about, then write about it, then argue it – that’s what I will do in actual practice, so the entire experience is invaluable.”In the Cardozo competition, the students had to research an international free speech and terrorism case. The mock case involved a Twitter-like entity that allowed a user to publish false revenge photos of a political figure in a compromising situation with a terrorist.In a short timeline, the team had to research international statutes, write two briefs over Christmas break and prepare for the early February competition.“We had to work together,” said Starnes.