Proud sponsors of WitEx for more than 25 years

WitEx provides New Zealand law students a unique opportunity to practise their advocacy skills in a friendly environment resembling a real courtroom hearing. The competition is fun, rewarding and a great training experience for aspiring courtroom lawyers.

The preliminary rounds and finals are held in the first half of each year, and MinterEllisonRuddWatts has proudly sponsored this competition for more than 25 years.

What to expect and how to prepare to be an outstanding competitor

WitEx requires you to act as counsel in a mock court hearing before a judge. You will either appear as counsel for the prosecution/plaintiff or the defence/defendant. In each round, you will present an opening and closing address to the court and call one witness to prove your set of facts and support your case.

The key to success at WitEx is your direct examination and cross-examination of the witnesses, and you will learn a lot from the experience.

The problem question will be given to you 90 minutes before the hearing. It helps to have a general understanding of the law of evidence – 20/100 marks are allocated to how you deal with evidence law. The most important skills to demonstrate are an ability to get the information you need from a witness and to present compelling arguments.

Winners from each regional competition have the opportunity to travel to Australia midyear to compete against the winners from each Australian university at the ALSA Conference.

2019 WitEx winners

MinterEllisonRuddWatts congratulates the winners of each regional university WitEx Competition for 2019:

University:	Winner:	Runner-up:
University of Auckland	Bronwyn Wilde	Luke Sweeney
AUT University	Tessa Whale	Chontell Lewis
University of Canterbury	Robert Petch	Tom Bagnell
University of Otago	Jacobi Kohu-Morris	Penny Mander
Victoria University of Wellington	Oliver Fredrickson	Fergie Catayoc
University of Waikato	Tania Powell	Keana Fletcher-Mathews

Important details and dates

Useful resources