Pig cleared in wolf-cooking trial
B.B. Wolf brought the claim against Pig after an August 2007 incident in which Wolf nearly fell into an open cauldron of boiling water at Pig's house.
Pig claimed she had removed the cauldron's lid as a warning when she heard Wolf crawling down inside the chimney of her brick colonial-style home.
Wolf maintains that he and Pig are former friends and that he was surprised, not only at her action of removing the cauldron's lid, but that her recipe book was opened to a recipe for poached wolf.
But Pig's attorney, 9-year-old Mckensie Wood, said Wolf had a long history of harassing Pig.
"He was clearly up to no good," Wood said.
Following Monday's trial, the jury of five boys and seven girls agreed that Wolf failed to adequately defend himself and that his story lacked credibility.
They cited examples of pigicide in which Wolf had eaten two of Pig's siblings after demolishing each of their homes, constructed of sticks and straw respectively.
Wolf's attorney, 8-year-old Kiera Wheadon, had objected to the presentation of that evidence, calling it "character assassination."
"Gentle animals, if you don't stopped this bickering I'm going to have to hold all of you in contempt of court," Kay said
Wolf's defense was plagued with problems, jurors said.
Annaleah Otteson said she never believed Wolf, played by 9-year-old Coleman Hedberg.
Olivia Sturgeon said Wolf and his attorney failed to outline a strong defense for why he entered Pig's chimney, so she sided with Pig's argument that she acted in self-defense.
Pig, played by Elle Richards, said she was surprised and relieved at the jury's verdict.
The 8- and 9-year-olds who participated in and packed a courtroom to watch the Big Bad Wolf v. The Three Little Pigs mock trial Monday attend Farmington's Eagle Bay Elementary.
Their teacher Kathy Kay, is married to Judge Kay and has been bringing her classes to district court to stage mock trials for the past four years.
The students try out for the parts of plaintiff, defendant, attorneys and court clerk and read or recite lines from a script.
The American Bar Association has created 14 scripts for use in kindergarten through sixth-grade classrooms. They are for sale at the association's Web site: www.abanet.org.
Other mock trials include Cinderella v. Estate of Padre Mia Tremaine, Humpty Dumpty v. Sherman King, United States v. Bunyan and Wicked Witch v. Snow White.
Kathy Kay adds an element of reality by recruiting her judge husband to use a real courtroom for the trials.
The visit to the court gave the third-graders a chance to see that court isn't a forbidding place, Judge Kay said.
The students spent some time asking Judge Kay questions about high-profile cases, which cases are his favorite to handle (adoptions) and which are his least favorite (divorces) and how one gets to be a district judge (governor's appointment).
E-mail: jdougherty@desnews.com
Recent comments
The Wolf will just buy some courtside Jazz tickets for Utah state...
So what's the problem? | April 29, 2008 at 3:39 p.m.
This is the problem with our legal system--the assumption of criminal...
ACLU | April 29, 2008 at 12:25 p.m.
"Educator" -- The difference between the case you referenced...
Thomas | April 29, 2008 at 11:53 a.m.
