Registered Last, Came Out First. How to Prepare for the Helga Pederson Moot Court Competition and Win

When they heard their names being announced as the winners in Strasbourg on 23 May, they were overwhelmed with joy, and also relieved that it was finally over. The student team, which consisted of Alice Sklenářová, the captain, Dan Sklenář, Matěj Plewa, and Jakub Kozumplík, was coached by JUDr. Mgr. Alla Tymofeyeva, Ph.D. from the Department of International Law. They had been preparing consistently for months, not even taking a break during the examination period. In fact, they registered for the competition at the last minute, and the best orator of the preliminary round and the Grand Final, Matěj Plewa, registered even later than that as he replaced a former team member. What was the preparation and the competition itself like?

Your team registered for the competition quite late. Why was that? 

Alla T.: Yes, that’s true. My students wanted me to organise the selection procedure for the Faculty team earlier, so I organised it before the summer break. Usually, it is held in September. Alice, Jakub, and Dan signed up for the competition. I sent an e-mail to all three of them, proposing our first meeting, but it was summer, so all of them responded saying they were abroad and that they would only have time for the competition in September. I thought to myself that it was not worth it if we could not even agree on the very first meeting and told them that the Faculty would not be putting together a team this year. Then, in September, I learnt from the Dean that one of the regional rounds would take place in Prague and he thought that it would be a good idea to have our team there and show our skills. I was rather sceptical about getting the students together on such short notice, but I approached Alice, Jakub, and Dan again as well as the students enrolled in my Case-law of the European Court of Human Rights course. In the end, I managed to get a team together and we registered for the competition. Had it not been for the Dean’s suggestion, there would not have been a team competing in this year’s edition of the moot, and obviously, no chance of winning. I would like to thank him again with all my heart for his enthusiasm and interest in the Faculty competitions. He was right and we definitely did show off our skills.

Can you describe the selection procedure? Were you the only decision-maker? Which criteria did you apply?

Alla T.: It was me who selected the team members. I registered four students for the competition: Alice, Dan, Jakub, and another student whose name I’d rather not mention. During the first month of preparation, we found out that one the team members was not as engaged as we would have needed. For example, she travelled abroad without telling me, even though during the interviews I had asked the students in detail about their availability and stressed that the written pleading must be ready before Christmas, which meant there was very little time. Anyway, it was not really about the fact that she left, but about the way she communicated with us. We found out as per the competition rules, you may request to change a team member in exceptional cases. You need to send a written request and the ELSA International Board either approves or rejects the request. We decided to take the risk and apply for the change. There was no time to waste, it did not make sense to launch a new selection procedure. Dan mentioned that he had a friend who had been awarded the best orator in a Czech human rights competition and that he would try to ask him. This is how we ended up submitting the request to the ELSA International Board with Matěj as the replacement. We waited with our fingers crossed to hear whether the Board would approve the change in the team because otherwise it could also lead to our disqualification from the moot. Luckily, our application was approved and Matěj, who later became the best orator of all, joined our team.

Was the topic known in advance or did the participants only learn it on the spot? 

Alla T.: The topic was of course provided in advance. We received 8 pages of written instructions regarding the Marlier v. Zemland Case, available on the website of the Helga Pedersen competition. 

What was the case about?

Alice S.: The case was fictional but it could have been from real life. It was about a woman who grew cannabis on a large scale, which she used for medical purposes and distributed to other sick people. She was convicted and almost all of her property was confiscated as part of her sentence. The right to respect for private and family life under Article 8 of the Convention and the right to protect property under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 were concerned in the case. We had to dive into how a state may (not) punish conduct which lies somewhere in between crime and solidarity. 

Was this topic close to you personally?

Alice S.: No, it wasn’t, but the questions brought up by the case – the limits of punishment, proportionality, interferences with private life and property – are definitely close to my heart. 

Dan S.: The issue of growing cannabis for medical purposes is close to me in the sense that it has been a part of the public debate in the Czech Republic for many years now. Me personally, I’m on the liberal side of the argument.

Can you describe your journey through the competition? Many applicants for study read the Faculty website and do not know much about the topic yet...

Alice S.: The competition is divided into several stages but it is not a linear process. It is more like watching the tide – some really intense moments, some waiting, and some anxiety. First, you draft the written submissions, which are fictional pleadings to the European Court for Human Rights – one on behalf of the applicant and one on behalf of the government. Unlike certain other moot courts, you do not qualify for the regional round only on the basis of these submissions. The order of the teams which are invited for the final round is based on the number of points they receive for their written submissions and for their oral pleadings in the regional round. That means that your arguments must be strong not only on paper but also before the judges. In total, 18 teams from across Europe compete in the final round, which is held in Strasbourg. 

What was your strategy for the preparation?

Alice S.: First, we wanted to really grasp the essence of the case. Not only to research all the case-law, but to see the case in the broader context. Then we analysed, tested, and rebuilt each other’s arguments. We did not just say: let's divide the work and each of us will write their own part of the submission. We all worked on everything, we shared the documents, discussed all the questions together or, at times, just stayed silent, sitting next to each other and looking for what was wrong with our reasoning.

After we completed the submissions, we started preparing for the oral part of the competition. We worked on our style and form, and practiced our replies to the judges’ questions. We wanted to be brief and persuasive at the same time.

Alla T.: It was mostly about the students’ willingness to do the hard work on their own. None of this would have been possible if they weren’t really invested in the case. You cannot just learn something by heart in this kind of competition, you have to really understand the issue and find the answers to the individual questions yourself. As far as my involvement goes, I provided access to the Faculty television studio, where the students could replay their recordings and analyse their strengths and weaknesses to learn what they should work on. We also created an excel document with questions that we anticipated from the judges and some possible replies on the basis of our mock hearings. I invited my colleagues from the Faculty, as well as some practising lawyers I know, experts on the European Convention on Human Rights, to sit on the panels of judges for these mock hearings. I also invited native speakers who do not specialise in human rights as judges. In addition, I simulated a moot court with the same instructions as in the Helga Pedersen competition in one of my classes within the optional subject Case-law of the ECtHR, where team members acted as the judges. In the Internal Law II seminars, I assigned seminar papers on the topic of the legalisation of marijuana and sent them to the team. One student in the Case-law course submitted a very long and detailed ECHR judgment in the Marlier v. Zemland Case, which served as the instructions for the competition. Allow me to thank all my colleagues and students at the Faculty whose work contributed to the team’s victory.

You were the captain of the winning team. What were your responsibilities? Can you describe the division of roles in the team?

Alice S.:  There were four of us on the team. We divided ourselves into the applicant and the government but, in fact, we all worked on everything. We shared our research, arguments, and texts. My role as the captain meant that I coordinated our activities – I had to keep an eye on the deadlines and ensure that nothing got lost and that we stayed on the track even when things got hard.

There were always three of us arguing the case in the oral part and the remaining team member performed the role of advisor, who watched our performances, prepared our replies, and analysed our tactics. The division of work was very natural, without any rivalry in the team.

How would you describe the atmosphere during the competition?

Alice S.:  There was obviously a lot of tension. Everyone wants to perform at their best. But, at the same time, it was very friendly – we got to know teams from many different countries and even if we stood against each other before the judges, we often talked with each other outside the courtroom, discussing our ideas and sometimes even exchanging our notes.

As the captain, I tried to make sure that the team remained calm even if we were all nervous. The night before our pleading, we went through our reasoning and the questions that might come up one last time and, in the morning, we just drank our coffee and gathered our thoughts in silence. But as soon as we entered the courtroom, everything sort of “clicked”.

Jakub. K.: On the one hand, the competition was quite intense and exhaustion started to set in, especially before the finale. On the other hand, we had a great vibe in the team, which helped us cope with the stress of the pleadings. Also, it was a great opportunity to meet many intriguing people from many different member states of the Council of Europe.

Dan S.: It was not only a great opportunity to get experience in the area of international protection of human rights, but also to meet many new people with similar interests. I would also like to commend the brilliant organisational skills on the part of ELSA International.

Matěj, your journey to become a team member was rather unconventional…

Matěj P.: I only became a team member in December, two months after the team had registered for the competition, as a replacement for one of the original team members. It was Dan who offered me to participate in the competition. I accepted immediately, without really thinking about the demands of the competition because I had made a similar spontaneous decision when I joined Dan for the Human Rights Moot Court organised by the Czech Society for European and Comparative Law, where we were succeeded. To be honest, I did regret Dan’s proposal later, especially during the examination periods. The preparation was much more time-consuming and mentally demanding than I expected, when I enthusiastically joined the team. But, looking back, I definitely do not regret having participated in the competition. It was an extremely enriching and meaningful experience which was definitely worth the few weeks of discomfort and mental strain.

You were crowned as the best orator in the preliminary round as well as the Grand Final. Did it come as a surprise? Were you happy with your performance?

Matěj P.: When you take part in a team competition, you are responsible not only for your outcome and reputation, but also for the final result of your whole team. So, what I worried about the most throughout the whole competition was that I would give a weak performance which would bring the team down. This fear, which did not go away until the end of the competition, proved to be quite a powerful motivator, so I did not really have time to think about individual awards. Of course, after my final pleading, which I felt good about in general, the thought of the award did flash through my mind since I had already received it in the regional round, where my performance was poorer than in the finale. Anyway, I primarily wanted my team to succeed, a collective victory is always all that sweeter and much more fun to celebrate.

What did you focus on in your pleading? Why do you think the judges liked your performance?

Matěj P.: I did not mention any ground-breaking fact in my pleading that the other teams would not have known about. The knowledge of the applicable case-law of the ECHR and the principles arising from the case-law was very good in general and in principle, the teams worked with similar legal arguments.

I believe we stood out due to the clarity and structure of our reasoning. We put a lot of effort into identifying the key legal problems and relevant arguments for both parties and aimed to present them in a concise manner. The fact is that the judges did not have our written submissions available for our oral pleadings, so they could easily get lost in the teams’ reasoning and miss out on the key arguments. We therefore tried to avoid empty rhetoric and explaining the general bases following from the relevant case-law. Instead, we focused on the facts of the case and the related legal regulation. I think I managed to do this exceptionally well in the last five minutes of my speech in the final round, which might have been one of the reasons why I was declared the best orator in the Grand Final.

Alla, can you describe Matěj Plewa’s performance? What made it special? 

Alla T.: Simply put, Matěj never stopped looking for the heart of the matter and kept coming up with endless hypotheses, which he either disproved, or elaborated further depending on whether he stood on the side of the government, or the applicant. Matěj and Dan acted as both parties in the competition. Alice pleaded only for the applicant and Kuba for the government of Zemland. The preparation was more demanding for Dan and Matěj, who had to plead for both parties. Kuba compensated this, for example, by doing extra work to study the instructions in detail, so that he could always quickly identify the individual aspects of the case when there were questions related to the facts of the case. In addition to doing a great job as the applicant, Alice dealt with all the organisational issues perfectly, both during the preparation and then in Strasbourg. 

Which qualities would you highlight on your team? Why do you think they won? 

Alla T.: They have many different qualities. Each of them is a personality in their own right with a unique story. I think that Matěj contributed to their victory significantly, not only by being the best orator, but by encouraging a certain style of communication and mutual support when he joined the team. Once they started spending more time together, his personality had an influence on everyone else. At the same time, each team member gave their best. But one person does not make a team. Alice as the captain was an exceptional organiser. Dan and Matěj work together in a law firm, so I think they talked about the case a lot even outside school. And Kuba’s English is excellent, he has a really nice British accent. Last but not least, all team members are really likeable, so they made a great impression on the judges.  

Alice, what would you highlight on your team as the captain?

Alice S.: That we all pulled together. No exceptions. No one was acting as the star, no one tried to avoid any work. We all spent an enormous amount of time preparing for the competition and, at the same time, we were honest with each other when something was not ideal. We built trust in the team and stayed focused on our common goal. 

What was the most memorable moment for you? 

Alla T.: I mostly think back to our first day in Strasbourg, when we practised our pleadings for one last time before the competition. We were all in a great mood and having fun. I think nobody was really thinking about a big victory that day, we were just enjoying the sun and the beautiful city.  

Matěj P.: Our preparation during the Grand Final each night at the hotel in Strasbourg. The last time I had felt such sense of togetherness and a common goal was during my football career – and I have to say that its absence did create a certain hole in my life. It does not come around very often when you practise law or study.

Alice S.: I will never forget the moment when the teams which qualified for the quarterfinals were announced. We thought we did not stand a chance and I stopped listening after the fifth place was announced, thinking to myself: oh well, it was great anyway. When I heard our name in third place, it took me a while to realise what was happening. Then, there was laughter, relief, and a new wave of anxiousness. 

Jakub K.:  There were quite a few memorable moments in the course of the competition, but none of them compare with the joy I felt after the announcement of the final results.

Dan S.:  I will always remember the glass of wine and the cigarette I savoured at the reception organised by Malta after the end of the competition after a week filled with hard work and stress.

Which of your competing teams did you like and why? 

Alice S.: I really liked the Dutch teams. They were very professional but not affected. They had strong reasoning, excellent language skills, and they seemed very confident even when responding to difficult questions. 

Dan S.: I think that all of our competitors did a great job. I am really thankful for the friendly atmosphere which was created among the competing teams. I can mention in particular the teams from Georgia and Germany, though his goes for all the remaining teams as well.

Jakub K.: I really liked how the teams from Maastricht and Groningen pleaded their cases, but all the teams were really good and none of them underestimated the preparation. I would also highlight the friendly atmosphere.

What are your next study plans?

Jakub. K.: My next study plan is to finish fourth year.

Alice S.: I would like to go on an Erasmus stay and also a traineeship – I hope I will be able to do both during my last year of studies. Meanwhile, I have to complete my thesis, pass all my exams, and perhaps attend some other moot courts. We’ll see. 

What would you like to do after you finish your studies?

Matěj P.: After getting my master’s degree, I would like to continue studying in a doctoral study programme at the Law Faculty of Charles University. Luckily, I still have one more year to make a final decision about my future.

Alice S.:  I can see myself working in the public sector, I would like to work for the Czech Republic, be it abroad in an international organisation, or here as a judge. I also intend to continue my studies in a doctoral study programme. I am most interested in European law, administrative law, and criminal law. 

Jakub K.: I can’t answer this question yet.

Dan S.: I don’t know.

The Helga Pederson Moot Court Competition (HPMCC), which is held in English, is organised for law students by the Council of Europe in cooperation with the European Law Students Association. This year’s 13^th edition of the competition welcomed 8 university teams from 14 different countries, including Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain, Ukraine, and the UK. The teams were selected on the basis of their written submissions and their performance in the regional rounds.

The competing teams faced off for victory over a fictional case concerning the use of cannabis for medical purposes and the right to respect for private life, personal autonomy, and property law. The judges consisted of current and former ECHR judges, a member of the office of the President of the Court, and the author of the case. The panel was chaired by Judge Gilberto Felici from San Marino.