Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, May 3, 1995                   TAG: 9505030032
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: LAURENCE HAMMACK STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

SOMETHING FISHY HERE, YOUR HONOR

"Guilty, guilty, guilty," a prosecution witness chided the two defendants from her front-row seat.

"I'm innocent until proven guilty," Mandriell Custer replied smugly.

So began a mock trial that mixed fourth-graders' antics with a lesson in American jurisprudence. The question was whether Mandriell and Miranda Bryant committed "fishslaughter" in the death - which did not actually occur - of a pet fish in their classroom at Fallon Park Elementary School.

When Peggy King's class decided several months ago to stage the mock trial, casting was not a problem.

"Some kids are more argumentative than others, so we chose them as the attorneys," King said.

By the time the case went to trial Tuesday in a Roanoke courtroom, every student had a part to play - from defendants and trial lawyers to bailiffs, witnesses and jurors. Philip Parker, a Roanoke lawyer and the class mentor as part of the Young Lawyer Division of the Virginia Bar Association, presided as judge.

The students' interest in the court system has been heightened by media coverage of the O.J. Simpson murder case. "I don't think I had ever been asked about a sidebar" by a fourth-grader before the Simpson trial began, Parker said.

But the focus Tuesday was on the two girls, whom King and several of her students testified they saw in the classroom shortly before the prized algae eater turned belly-up dead. Prosecutor Megan Nicely established motive, telling the jury that neither girl was fond of fish.

But Mandriell testified that the fish jumped out of the tank on its own.

Police Officer Daniel Wright testified that the story sounded "a little fishy" to him.

The jury agreed and convicted Mandriell and Miranda after deliberating less than five minutes - not an unusually short time, given the attention span of most fourth-graders.

After the verdict, Mandriell was asked if she had learned any valuable lessons about the criminal justice system. "Never stand around a fish tank," she said.