For your class project, you will ask and answer a specific question about one of the trials listed below or, with permission, one of the trials covered on my website. Your "answer" (paper) should be a minimum of 1400 words and a maximum of 2200 words.  Your question might address the historical or social impact of the trial.  Or you could consider whether a particular decision by one of the lawyers involved in the trial was wise or appropriate.  Or your question might address whether a particular action by a prosecutor, a lawyer, or a judge was ethical.  Or you might ask whether the jury made the right decision of gave sufficient weight to a particular piece of evidence.  In short, almost any question that relates to the trial and addresses a law-related issue is appropriate. Here are examples of possible topics: (1) Why did male and female jurors evaluate the evidence so differently in the first Mendendez Brothers trial?[all male jurors supported conviction, all female jurors opposed]; (2) How did Fidel Castro use his 1953 trial to his political advantage?; (3) Should Russell Henderson's attorney in the Matthew Shepard murder trial have persuaded him to plead guilty?. If you chose a topic relating to one of the trials covered on my website, the question you choose to answer should be one which I do not substantially answer in my coverage of the trial.

You will be required to determine the trial and question you will address by October 31 at the latest.