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Oral Hearings


General Round

There shall be two general rounds of the Competition. Each team shall argue once in each general round.

Unless otherwise notified by the Secretary, the first and the second general rounds will be held on the afternoon and the evening respectively of Friday, 6th March 2009. The Secretary will give due notice to the contact persons for participating institutions of the venue of the first and second general rounds.

 

Semi-Final and Final Rounds

There shall be a semi-final round of the Competition. Three teams each with highest aggregate scores (calculation pursuant to Rule 57) from the Prosecutor and Defendant side shall argue once in the semi-final round.

Unless otherwise notified by the Secretary, the semi-final and final rounds will be held in the morning and afternoon of Saturday, 7th March 2009 at the High Court of Hong Kong, 38 Queensway, Hong Kong in principle.

 

Rules Applicable to the General Rounds, Semi Final Round and the Final Round

Each team shall consist of a first counsel and a second counsel, as designated by the team or by its relevant participating institution.

Each team shall not, in any circumstance, be permitted to mention anything about their background (including country, city, university, etc.), which would otherwise be subject to a deduction of a fixed mark of 20 from the total score out of 200 of the counsel in concern, and in turn affect the team's score out of the total of 400 in each of the oral hearings, pursuant to Rule 67.

Each team shall speak for no more than 40 minutes. The first counsel and the second counsel for each team shall each speak individually for a minimum of 15 minutes.

Each team may reserve up to 10 minutes for rebuttal (in the case of a Prosecutor team) or surrebuttal (in the case of a Defendant team).

Each team shall indicate at the beginning of its oral argument, how long each counsel will speak and how much time it intends to reserve for rebuttal or surrebuttal.

Either the first counsel or the second counsel may address the court in rebuttal or surrebuttal. For the avoidance of doubt, the time reserved for rebuttal or surrebuttal is not included in the minimum time for each counsel to speak as specified in Rule 48.

The court may, in its discretion, extend the time for each counsel for good cause, provided that the maximum extension of time granted to any counsel shall not exceed 5 minutes.

Time shall be kept by a court clerk, who will warn counsels by appropriate means when they have:

  1. 5 minutes left;
  2. 1 minute left;
  3. to conclude their address forthwith.


The order of the oral presentations shall be:

  1. Prosecutor's first counsel;
  2. Prosecutor's second counsel;
  3. Defendant's first counsel;
  4. Defendant's second counsel;
  5. Rebuttal, if any (Prosecutor's first or second counsel);
  6. Surrebuttal, if any (Defendant's first or second counsel).

Every courtesy shall be given to oralists during oral hearings. Communication at the counsel table shall be in writing to prevent disruption, and teams and spectators shall avoid all unnecessary noise or other inappropriate behavior which distracts from the argument in progress.

Team members seated at the counsel table shall not be permitted to communicate with spectators, or with any other external person except the judges. Without limiting the foregoing, with respect to delegations that include a Researcher, counsels shall not be permitted to communicate with the Researcher during the oral hearings and the Researcher shall not be permitted to sit with counsels at the counsel table.

 

Semi-finalist Teams

The three Prosecutor teams and the three Defendant teams with the highest average score out of 500 after the completion of the general rounds will meet in the semi-final round. Each team's average score out of 500 shall be determined by combining its memorial score out of 100 with the average of its two oral hearing scores out of 400 awarded in the general rounds, pursuant to Rules 65 through 68 below.

In the event that, after the completion of the general rounds, more than three Prosecutor teams or more than three Defendant teams have scores so that two or more of them have tied for eligibility for the semi-final round, then the Prosecutor or Defendant team to proceed to the semi-final round shall be the team from those which have the highest average score out of 400 for its oral hearings in the general rounds. In the further event that such teams are also tied in their average score out of 400 for oral hearings in the general rounds, the team which will proceed to the semi-final round shall be the team whose first counsel has the highest average score out of 200 for his or her oral hearings in the general rounds. Where more than two teams have tied, the Secretary shall adopt his discretion pursuant to Rule 82 to discuss with the respective judges and the decision after discussion shall be final.

 

Finalist Teams

The Prosecutor team and the Defendant team with the highest score out of 400 after the completion of the semi-final rounds will meet in the final round. Each team's score out of 400 shall be purely calculated based on the average oral hearing scores out of 400 awarded in the semi-final round, pursuant to Rules 65 through 68 below.
In the event that, after the completion of the semi-final round, any two Prosecutor teams or two Defendant teams tie for the highest score out of 400, the Prosecutor or Defendant team which will proceed to the final round shall be the team which memorial has the highest average score out of 100. In the further event that both such teams are also tied in their average score out of 100 for their memorials, the team which will proceed to the final round shall be the team whose first counsel has the highest average score out of 200 for his or her oral hearings in the semi-final round.

The Secretary shall apply the same rule as mentioned in Rule 60 according to its principle to tied case in the final round.