Originally published in Student Lawyer magazine, September 2003 (Vol. 32, No. 1)

Missouri- Columbia School of Law Wins Client Counseling Competion

University of Missouri-Columbia School of Law graduates Sherri Harris and George Smith sum up their winning strategy in the 2002-03 ABA Law Student Division Client Counseling Competition in two words: keep digging.

"We had an unbelievably complex problem for our final," says Harris, who graduated law school with Smith last spring. "After listening to our client's story, we knew there was something more. We kept digging until we discovered that, what initially looked like a simple stolen-goods case was really a murder."

Harris believes that figuring this out early in the interview gave her team a great advantage. "Many of the other teams didn't know the whole story until the very end," she says.

Offered each year by the Law Student Division, the Client Counseling Competition focuses on preventive law and effective counseling. Student competitors act as lawyers and conduct a 30-minute interview with a mock client. The students then have 15 minutes to determine how they would advise this client in a real-world situation. They are judged on their ability to form both legal and nonlegal solutions to their client's hypothetical problem. This year's topic was criminal law.

Harris and Smith competed against 116 other teams from across the nation. The final rounds were held at Stetson University College of Law in St. Petersburg, Fla.

Harris believes that their ability to relax and have fun with the process helped. "We didn't expect to win," she says. "In fact, we didn't train or practice in the same way that many of the teams did. George and I are both older students with a lot of life experience. It really helped when it came to problem solving and thinking of creative solutions. Of course, it was sort of intimidating when people came in with a team of coaches and several four- inch-thick books, and George and I had a pad and a pen."

Smith, however, suggests it was their relationship that put them over the top. "We worked together really well," he says. "She is very approachable and has a natural knack for putting people at ease. I'm a lot more technical."

Harris describes it as a good-cop, bad-cop routine. "While I was being warm and gentle, George was trying to get straight to the point," she says. "Our relationship and style just meshed."

Professors Stephen Easton and Rodney Uphoff coached the team. "These two will be extremely good lawyers," Uphoff says of Harris and Smith. "They're great problem solvers and very good listeners."

The national finalists in the competition were Richard Agins and Marga Gordon from Pace University School of Law, and Michelle Chenault and Marty Estes from Southern Methodist University School of Law.

Kenneth Gorton

How to Enter the 2003-04 Competitions