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Law Day 2008: Putnam County holds 29th annual mock trialFor the 29th year, the Putnam County Bar Association conducted a Law Day mock trial with high school students. For the first time, Walter Durley Boyle was not a speaker. The 94-year-old Hennepin lawyer, a main-stay of Law Day programs past and former county state’s attorney for 40 years, died April 13 (ISBA Bar News, May, page 38). But the show must go on, and it did, on April 25, with the able participation of 10th Circuit Judge Scott A. Shore and Putnam County Bar President Roger C. Bolin, Boyle’s law partner. They wrote the script for a trial that seniors from the Putnam County High School interpreted. Judge Shore, who chaired the courthouse program, told of the history of Law Day and the importance of the rule of law as a foundation of judicial independence in deciding cases without political interference. He also commented on Boyle’s “immeasurable absence” and spoke of the letter that Abraham Lincoln sent to Boyle’s great-grandfather in the 1850s. The civil case of plaintiff Herb Bivore v. defendant Shurley Fickle involved a “breach of prom” for which Bivore sought compensation for costs and $100,000 for pain and suffering. Bivore had reserved a limousine for the two of them, prepaid for a gourmet luncheon, ordered exotic flowers for Fickle and a satin-silk tuxedo for himself. Then, three days before the prom, his date e-mailed that she had changed her mind. State’s attorney Norman K. Raffety helped prepare the plaintiff team. James A. Mack of Peru and Christine Judd Mennie assisted the defense counsel. Students filled the roles of judge, lawyers, litigants, witnesses, jurors, circuit clerk, court reporter and bailiff. The jury awarded $4,900 in actual damages for the plaintiff, but denied him an award for pain and suffering. The senior class also met courthouse staff members and toured county offices and the jail. Thirteen of them used the opportunity to register to vote.
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