The media center at Salem School was transformed into a courtroom on the morning of March 16, where the Honorable P.J. Sorrentino, a seventh-grader, presided over a criminal case. Pat Morton, a student at the fictitious Village Secondary School played by Salem eighth-grader Josh Fresco-Hawes, was charged with allegedly taking a laptop from Mountain Top High School.

Sorrentino addressed the jury, explaining that the prosecution claimed that Morton took an Apple laptop, valued at $2,200, a charge of first-degree theft. He said Morton admitted to taking the computer but claims he had permission to borrow it. Morton said he did not know his brother had been planning to sell the stolen laptop to pay for Morton’s class trip to Washington, D.C.

The mock trial was part of a new civics program for seventh and eighth-grade students at Salem School. Students took on roles as prosecutors, witnesses and jury members to experience the judicial system in action.

Following testimony from witness from both sides of the case, the student jury adjourned to the computer lab for deliberation. Students in the audience sat quietly, talking to each other in hushed tones as they awaited the jury’s decision. Would Morton be found guilty of first-degree theft?

While they waited, Norwich-based attorney Mary Puhlick discussed the case and asked for quick show of hands to see who thought Morton was guilty. Every student but one said yes, which garnered a room full of giggles.

“You heard Pat’s brother say that he cooked up this whole scheme, so how could Pat have known that he was there to steal a computer?” she asked after explaining how the court defines theft. “[It] was one of the elements that the prosecution had to prove to you, that Pat intended to do this, not his brother.”

When she took another vote, very few students said he was guilty, though several said that Pat Morton’s brother, played by seventh-grade student Noah Brunelle, should go to jail since he came up with the plan to steal the laptop.

After a 10-minute deliberation, the jury declared the defendant not guilty, and attorney Kristi Hanney, who practices law in Norwich and Hartford and served as the courtroom deputy during the mock trial, stepped forward to discuss the final decision.

“The jury had to weigh the evidence and decide whether or not they felt that his guilt was proven beyond a reasonable doubt, which is what we call the burden of proof in the courtroom,” she said. “There was a lot of debate, and that is the reason why sometimes jury deliberations in real cases can take many days.”

The March 16 trial was a practice run for the class’ trip to the Superior Court in Norwich April 1 to conclude the civics class, which is part of the Connecticut Bar Association’s Civics Education Committee advisory program.

Puhlick said the students will also be able to talk to the judge at the Norwich courthouse and sit in on an arraignment court session that day.

Similar programs have been done in Groton, Norwich and New London.

Since January, Hanney and Puhlick have engaged students in lessons and games about the Constitution, the balance of power in government, and a special unit on primaries and caucuses. Hanney said the curriculum changes a bit from year to year, and the Salem students were interested in learning more about how the presidential primary process works. They created a unit where the class was divided into political parties based on their stance on school dress codes.

“They had to caucus and determine who their candidate was going to be, and then the candidates had to stand up in front of the class and give a little platform statement based on their party,” she said. “We were actually very surprised by how much the kids knew about what was going on, even before we started teaching them anything.”

Social studies teacher Brian Fleming said there has been a push for more civics programming for eighth-grade students, but he also opened the program to seventh-grade students who were interested.

“When I told the jurors they were selected, they were very excited,” he said. “The real world application is priceless for them to be able to experience this.”

a.hutchinson@theday.com