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American Studies Court Case
Table of Contents
Reading 1: Walker War (pg. 2)
Reading 2: Walker War (Alexander) (pg. 3)
Reading 3: Brigham Young (history.com) (pg. 6)
Reading 4: Brigham Young (Utah State history) (pg. 8)
Reading 5: Chief Walker (Western Humanities Review) (pg. 9)
Reading 6: Chief Walker (Legends of America) (pg. 11)
Reading 7: Mock Trial Flow (pg. 12)
Reading 8: Court Roles (pg. 13)
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Reading 1: Walker War
Utah’s Walker War
Posted on September 20, 2010 by Ojibwa
( – promoted by navajo)
The Walker War was a conflict between the Mormon settlers in Utah and Utah’s aboriginal
peoples, the Ute. The leader of the Utes was Wakara, called Walker by the Mormons, and the
conflict became known as the Walker War.
Some Background:In 1850, Ute leader Wakara invited Brigham Young to attend the annual
Indian trade gathering in Utah Valley. Young and a delegation of Mormons met with the chiefs in
council. When a Shoshone group raided a Ute camp, Wakara asked Brigham Young for Mormon
militia support in the retaliation raid. The support was refused.
While angry with the Mormons for refusing aid, Wakara led his Ute warriors against the
Shoshone. Upon his return after effecting bloody retaliation on the Shoshone raiders, Wakara
and his band demonstrated in front of the settlement fort at Manti, showing off their war trophies.
Walker then decided to move north and attack the Mormon settlement at Provo. However, Ute
chief Sowiette persuaded him to call off the attack.
The War: In 1853, the Mormons killed a Ute man and wounded two others near Springville. The
fight originated over a trade of flour for fish. The slain man was one of Wakara’s relatives.
Wakara demanded that the killers be turned over to him. When Indians had killed Mormons, the
Mormons had always demanded that the chiefs turn the killers over to Mormon authorities for
punishment. The Mormons, however, refused to turn the killers over to the Utes for punishment.
Tensions between Mormons and Utes culminated in the Walker War. Wakara, the chief of the
Tumpanuwac band of Utes, led a series of effective raids against Mormon communities to
obtain food and livestock.
In response to the raids, the Utah Territorial Militia was mobilized. Behind this organization stood
the full power of the Mormon church. Many of the highest ranking militia and civil leaders were
also ranking church officials.
At Clover Creek a Mormon group driving cattle was attacked by a Ute party, but their militia
escort drove them off. The militia reported killing as many as five Ute warriors.
Acting in direct violation of general orders a Mormon militia unit attacked a Ute camp near
Goshen, killing four or five people. The Ute survivors escaped death by hiding in the marshes
until the attacking militia left.
When a group of Ute came to the fort at Nephi seeking protection, the townspeople killed them
“like dogs.” One eyewitness wrote:“Nine Indians coming into our camp looking for protection and
bread with us … were shot down without one minute’s notice”
Another eyewitness writes:“They were shot down like so many dogs, picked up with pitchforks
[put] on a sleigh and hauled away”
In 1854, the Walker War ended when Ute chiefs Ammon and Migo indicated that they were
ready for peace. The Ute warriors recognized that they were hopelessly outnumbered and
outgunned. When Wakara returned from the Navajo country he also agreed to peace. He asked
for food, guns, and ammunition.
The peace negotiations were carried out at Chicken Creek. Initially, Wakara refused to leave his
tent, but Brigham Young entered the lodge. Young laid his hands upon Wakara’s sick daughter
and gave her a blessing. After a long and patient negotiation, Walkara was able to accept defeat
without humiliation.
This entry was posted in Uncategorized and tagged Mormons, Utah, Ute Indians, Wakara by
Ojibwa. Bookmark the permalink.
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Reading 2: Walker War
Thomas G. Alexander
Utah, The Right Place
Although the Paiutes worked out an accommodation of sorts with the Mormon immigrants, the
settlers' occupation of lands that the Utes used for hunting and gathering, along with Mormon
attempts to suppress the New Mexican trade, disrupted the Ute economy and society. With such
highly combustible tinder laid, a seemingly isolated spark set the territory afire with war. On July
17, 1853, several Utes were trading at James Ivie's home near Springville when Ivie intervened
in a dispute between a Ute man and his wife over her failure to strike a good bargain. Ivie tried
to prevent the couple and a companion from carrying their dispute into his cabin. In the ensuing
melee, Ivie killed one of the men, a relative of Walkara's named Shower-Ocats.
Under orders from Col. George A. Smith, Capt. Stephen C. Perry of the Springville Militia led a
unit the next day into Walkara's camp about five miles up Payson (then Peteetneet) Canyon to
try to mollify the outraged Utes. Perry discussed the matter with the Utes for a time. Then, when
he and his troops realized that they risked death at the hands of the infuriated Utes, the beat a
hasty retreat.
Walkara bargained with the settlers, demanding the usual Numic retribution--the death of one
Euro-American. The settlers refused to pay that price, and two of Walkara's associate chiefs,
Arapeen and Wanship, opposed compromise. Taking some of his followers to Payson, Arapeen
killed a guard named Alexander Keel. Recognizing that Keel's death would bring the wrath of
the Mormon settlers on his followers, Walkara led his people on a flight up Payson Canyon. On
the way, they fired on settlers' cabins and stole about twenty head of cattle and six horses.
Hearing of Keel's death and apparently assuming that Walkara would follow the Mount Nebo
loop into Salt Creek Canyon on his way into Sanpete Valley, Col. Peter W. Conover of the Utah
County Militia sent several units up Payson Canyon and personally led a punitive expedition of
150 men up Salt Creek Canyon toward Manti to try to intercept Walkara and his followers.
General Wells apparently recognized the gravity of these clashes. Dreading a return to the
bloodshed of 1849 and 1850, Wells ordered Conover to disband his troops and to act entirely on
the defensive. Before he received the orders, however, Conover had sent out a patrol to attack
a Ute camp east of Mount Pleasant (then Pleasant Creek) in Sanpete Valley. The militiamen
killed six Indians in a skirmish.
After receiving Wells's orders, Conover prepared to return to Utah Valley, but in the meantime,
Wells and Young issued further orders that anticipated even more thorough disengagement.
Ordering George A. Smith to assume command of all units south of Salt Lake County, they
instructed the settlers to abandon small outlying settlements and to gather in larger communities
with secure forts. As an extra precaution, they ordered all settlers to avoid activities that took
them away from the settlements alone or in small groups. Also, in an apparent attempt to
remove the temptation for raiding, they ordered the settlers to immediately send all stock not
needed for teams and milk to Salt Lake City for safekeeping. Later, Smith relieved Conover of
command and arrested him for his failure to implement the defensive and conciliatory policy in
Utah Valley.
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Smith encountered considerable hostility to his efforts to effect the policy of defense and
conciliation. Walkara made Smith's job more difficult since his soldiers attacked the settlers at
Spring City (then Allred Settlement) in Sanpete Valley, driving off virtually all the community's
livestock. Smith also encountered an open rebellion and had to accept the resignation of the
Cedar City Militia commander, Maj. Mathew Caruthers, before the community agreed to send
their stock to Salt Lake. Supervising the withdrawl of settlers to Parowan and Cedar City, Smith
collected stock from the various settlements and sent them northward. Attacks continued into
August 1853 as Utes tried to take a Salt Lake-bound herd of surplus cattle near Clover Creek in
the Rush Valley. The war spread into northern Utah as Utes attacked four men hauling lumber
near Park City, killing tow and wounding one other.
Walkara left for northern Arizona for the winter, but Wyonah, brother to Shower-Ocats, and other
sympathetic Utes continued fighting. During the fall, Utes killed and mutilated settlers, most of
whom were working in isolated parties outside the towns in defiance or disregard of the orders
to remain in large groups. Such attacks occurred at Fillmore, Fountain Green, Santaquin, and
Manti. Raids included the burning of Spring City, which the settlers had already abandoned, and
the theft of a large herd of cattle near Spanish Fork.
Instead of following a conciliatory policy as Young had directed, Mormon settlers responded in
brutal kind. A militia unit in Utah County assaulted a Ute camp near Goshen, killing four or five
people. At Nephi, on October 2, 1853, after eight or nine Utes came to the fort seeking
protection, a group of townspeople slaughtered them "like so many dogs" and then reported the
murders as deaths during a skirmish.
Undoubtedly, the murders with the greatest long-range consequence occurred on the early
morning of October 26, 1853, when Capt. John W. Gunnison of the Corps of Topographical
Engineers and a party of seven had camped on the lower Sevier River in Pahvant territory. The
murder of Gunnison and his party by the Pahvants may have come in retaliation for the death of
a Pahvant killed by members of a passing wagon train. Alternatively,the deaths--like those of
settlers working outside in small parties-- may have resulted from their distance because of
fortified settlements. More seriously for the Utah settlers, however, anti-Mormons attributed the
death to Mormons acting under Brigham Young's instructions.
Gunnison had previously assisted Captain Howard Stansbury, a topographical engineer, on
explorations in northern and central Utah. In 1849, Col. John J. Abert of the Corps of
Topographical Engineers had assigned Stansbury to retrace the route form Fort Leavenworth to
Fort Hall; explore a wagon road from the fort to the Great Salt Lake; examine the suitability of
the lake for transshipment of supplies form the Mormon settlements; survey the lake, the Jordan
River, and Utah Lake; determine the capacity of the Mormons to provide food and supplies for
overland travelers; report generally on the Mormon economy; and locate a site for a military post
near Salt Lake. The explorations of Stansbury and Gunnison, aided by Brigham Young's
secretary Albert Carrington, led to the publication of Stanbury's report and Gunnison's book The
Mormons in 1852, both of which offered favorable accounts of the Saints at a time when most
national observers considered them in about the same category as we would consider cultist
fanatics today.
In 1853, Col. Abert ordered Gunnison to survey a strip of land between the thirty-eight and
thirty-ninth parallels as part of a search for a transcontential railroad route. Anxious to determine
the most feasible and politically acceptable route from the Mississippi Valley to the Pacific
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Coast, Congress had authorized four surveys of possible transcontinental corridors. Gunnison
found the thirty-eighth parallel route unsuitable for a railroad, but his decision to camp on the
Sevier bottoms suited the Pahvants quite nicely.
Following the violence of late 1853 and early 1854, a number of Ute leaders offered terms for
peace. In spite of some raids in January and February 1854, Ute bands, camped in central and
southern Utah and headed by Chiefs Amon and Migo, said they were ready to lay down their
arms. In March and again in May, Walkara, who had since returned from Navajo country,
petitioned the settlers and Brigham Young for peace as well. Ever the shrewd trader, Walkara
asked for food, guns, and ammunition, offering to sell portions of central Utah lands in return for
annuities to be paid in cattle and horses over a twenty-year period. In addition, he wanted
security for his trade in Paiute captives.
Young also favored the renewal of normal relations and an end to war and murder. Trying to
work out an agreement, Young and Walkara met at Chicken Creek in Juab County on May 11,
1854. After Young arrived at Walkara's camp, the proud chief refused to come out of his tent to
greet Young, insisting that the governor come to him instead. Recognizing a tense and
potentially explosive situation, Young and George A. Smith walked to Walkara's tent. After they
arrived, they found one of his daughters seriously ill. Touched by her suffering, they gave her a
healing blessing.
Although the negotiations at Chicken Creek ended the immediate conflict, they solved none of
the underlying issues. In fact, they left open wounds that continued to ooze the blood of Utes
and Mormons through the Black Hawk War of the1860s. In February 1856, the Tintic War, a
series of skirmished named after a Ute subchief, inflamed the people in the Tintic and Cedar
Valleys, largely because Indians, who were starving in the drought, began taking cattle from the
settlers. The war resulted in a number of clashes and deaths.
The wars ended only after the federal government removed the Utes to the Uintah and Ouray
Reservation in the Uinta Basin during the late 1860s and early 1870s. Since the federal
government did not buy the Ute lands, the issues festered until after World War II, when the
Indian Claims Commission ordered payment for confiscated lands. Mormons forced the end of
the New Mexican trade in human beings, but only at the cost of continued payment for the
servants themselves.
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Reading 3: Brigham Young
BRIGHAM YOUNG
Author: History Channel
A towering figure in Mormonism, Brigham Young (1801-1877), began his professional career as
a carpenter and painter. Baptized a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
in 1832, he was ordained an apostle in 1835. After the assassination of Joseph Smith in 1844,
Young was chosen leader of the Mormons and continued as president until his death. He
directed the migration of 16,000 Mormons from Illinois to Utah from 1846 to 1852, and became
governor of the territory in 1851. In addition to bolstering his community through education and
the arts, Young contracted for the national expansion of telegraph and railroad lines.
Born in Whitingham, Vermont, Young was the ninth of eleven children. His family moved to New
York when he was three. Shortly after his mother’s death in 1815, he left home to make his
living as carpenter, joiner, glazier, painter, and landscape gardener.
DID YOU KNOW?
A believer in the doctrine of plural marriage, Young had 20 wives and fathered 47 children.
Young was baptized a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon) in
1832. He became an ardent missionary and disciple, and moved to Kirtland, Ohio, where he did
carpentry work and undertook preaching missions. He was ordained an apostle in 1835 and
became one of the Quorum of the Twelve, who directed missionary work, emigration and
settlement, and construction projects. In 1838-1839, he directed the removal of the Mormons
from Missouri to Illinois. He served as a missionary in Great Britain in 1840-1841, and upon his
return he was placed in charge of the business operations of the church. After the assassination
of Joseph Smith in 1844, Young was chosen leader of the Mormons and continued as president
until his death.
Young not only directed the migration of sixteen thousand Mormons from Illinois to Utah in
1846-1852 but also established the Perpetual Emigrating Fund Company, which during the
years 1852-1877 assisted approximately eighty thousand converts to migrate to Utah from
Great Britain, Scandinavia, and continental Europe. Young also directed the colonization and
development of some 350 settlements in Utah, Idaho, Wyoming, Nevada, Arizona and
California.
In 1861 Young contracted to build the transcontinental telegraph line from Nebraska to
California and then erected the twelve-hundred-mile Deseret Telegraph line from Franklin,
Idaho, to northern Arizona to connect all Mormon villages with one another and with Salt Lake
City. He also contracted to prepare the roadbed for part of the transcontinental railroad line and
then organized railroads to provide rail transportation for most Mormon communities in Idaho,
Utah and Nevada.
When Utah became a territory in 1851, Young was the first governor and superintendent of
Indian affairs, serving until 1858. As governor, he had repeated difficulties with ‘outside’ nonMormon presidential appointees, especially judges and territorial secretaries, who were envious,
if not fearful, of his power.
As president of the Mormon church, Young traveled to most settlements at least once a year,
where he listened to grievances, discussed problems, and informed himself of local events and
personalities. Under prodding from Young, Utah gave women the vote in 1870, thus recognizing
their political equality and also adding to Mormon vote pluralities.
Young constructed the Mormon Tabernacle in Salt Lake City and began the erection of the Salt
Lake Temple. He founded Brigham Young University; the University of Deseret, now University
of Utah; and the Salt Lake Theatre, where major actors and actresses performed.
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Young was a leading Western colonizer, energetic entrepreneur of new industry, astute
politician, friend of Native Americans, and effective sermonizer. The more than five hundred
recorded sermons he delivered over the thirty-three years of his leadership emphasize practical
religion-the improvement of living conditions, correct behavior, and the achievement of
harmonious social relationships.
The Reader’s Companion to American History. Eric Foner and John A. Garraty, Editors.
Copyright © 1991 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
Article Details:
Brigham Young
Author: History.com Staff
Website Name: History.com
Year Published: 2009
Title: Brigham Young
URL: http://www.history.com/topics/brigham-young
Access Date: November 13, 2014
Publisher: A+E Networks
This copy is for you personal, non-commercial use only.
© 1996-2013, A&E Television Networks, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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Reading 4: Brigham Young
A Huge Impact on Utah
Brigham Young, 1801-1877
Author: Utah Division of State History
In short:
In his role as emigration leader, leader of the LDS church, and Utah Territorial governor,
Brigham Young had a huge impact on the development of Utah. He chose the Salt Lake valley
as the first site of Mormon settlement. He sent people to settle areas that he chose, and in some
cases assigned them to certain work, like growing cotton. He also influenced the layout of
communities and how people thought and acted.
More of the story:
A future leader.
When Brigham Young was born, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons) didn’t
exist. But although Young was not born into a Mormon family, he is most famous for being the
prophet who led the Mormons west.
He joined the LDS church along with some of his close family members in 1832. His faith
deepened after he met the church founder, Joseph Smith, and Brigham became a very active
member of the young faith, both in America and on a mission in England.
Young takes control.
When a mob assassinated Smith in 1844, Brigham rose above several challengers to become
the next president of the church. When it became apparent that the Mormons weren’t going to
be able to stay in their community of Nauvoo, Illinois, he made the decision to head west in
hopes of finding a place to establish the "Kingdom of God"--a place where the Mormons could
worship and flourish in peace.
He led the first company west, and upon coming down Emigration Canyon on July 24, 1847,
made the famous “This is the right place” proclamation (at least, he said those words according
to one person remembering it many years later).
Shaping Utah.
Young had a huge influence on the establishment of the Mormon settlements in Utah. He
created the Perpetual Emigration Fund to help poor people emigrate from Europe to Utah. He
"called" Mormon settlers to colonize beyond Salt Lake City. And he tried to keep Utah an
agricultural territory. He did not want his people trying to get rich by mining.
When the federal government officially created the Utah Territory in 1850, Young became the
first territorial governor. However, his role as a religious leader, and the way most Mormons
obeyed him absolutely, made the government nervous. The practice of polygamy among the
Mormons didn’t help. So in 1857, the government sent a new territorial governor west, along
with a battalion of troops to make sure Young would allow the new governor to take his position.
Young continued on as leader of the Mormon church until his death in 1877. In the last decades
of life, he tried to make sure that non-Mormons entering the state, or the increasingly present
federal government, would not destroy the Mormon way of life.
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Reading 5: Chief Walker
WAKARA
Author: Tina Kelley and Kathryn L. MacKay
Wakara was a Ute Indian leader who was born about the year 1815 near the Spanish Fork river
in Utah, an area which was a meeting ground for the many bands of Utes based in the eastern
Utah canyons area. Kinship ties connected him to other Ute leaders such as Sowiette and
Arapeen. From his father, a Ute leader, and other older make kin, Wakara learned skills of
hunting and horsemanship. At an early age, Wakara became known for his prowess and came
to lead groups of young men in hunting and raiding expeditions. He was also skilled in learning
languages--Spanish and English, and so became a trader and negotiator with the non-Indians
invading Ute lands.
In the 1820s Wakara was one of the Ute leader who established trade relations with intruding
Euro-American fur traders--relations which proved profitable on all sides. After the 1829 opening
of the Old Spanish Trail, Ute leaders regularly stopped the caravans and demanded tribute for
crossing Ute lands. Wakara formed an alliance with mountain men Thomas "Pegleg" Smith and
James Beckworth and began regularly raiding for horses from settlements at both ends of the
trail, in New Mexico and California. By 1837 Wakara and his followers were getting wealthy
through tribute and trade, and Wakara was becoming legendary, often reported in several
places at the same time.
Wakara was also involved in the slave trade. Spaniards had made expeditions into Utah since
the 1740s, trading cloth and metal objects for furs and people. Raiding more sedentary Great
Basin Indian groups such as the Paiute, Wakara traded to Spaniards young men and women to
work in the mines of northern Mexico and in the homes of Spanish colonists.
One observer described Wakara in 1843 as the "principal ruling chief...ow [ing] his position to
great wealth. He is a good trader, trafficking with the whites and reselling goods to such as his
nation are less skillful in striking a bargain." Wakara was becoming the leader of larger numbers
of people as several bands coalesced with the invasion of the Europeans. This larger band
came to be known as the Tumpanawach.
In 1847 Mormon entered Ute lands. At first Wakara accepted their arrival, even inviting them to
settle. He was in hopes they would prove useful trading partners as had the fur traders, most of
whom had abandoned the area. Wakara even agreed to be baptized in the Mormon Church (13
March 1850) and several times allayed fears and misunderstandings on both sides.
However, the Mormon population grew and the Indian population declined through disease and
destruction of food resources. Mormon leaders moved to disrupt the Mexican trade in horses
and people (a law against the Mexican slave trade was passed by the territorial legislature in
1853), thereby undermining Wakara's wealth and power. Wakara grew to distrust the white
settlers as they encroached on Ute hunting lands and began resisting that encroachment.
In July 1853, while Wakara and his followers were camped on Spring Creek near Springville, a
altercation over trade took place in which a Mormon settler killed a Ute and wounded two
others. Wakara demanded the killer be brought before him. His request was refused. This
incident precipitated the Walker (Wakara) War.
The war was mainly a series of raids led by Wakara on the Mormon settlements. Utes attacked
Fort Payson; the Mormon Nauvoo Legion responded. During the next ten months fewer than
twenty whites were killed; many more Utes died, including nine "shot down without one minute's
notice," after they came into a Mormon camp looking for protection and bread.
The war, however, was futile. Brigham Young sent out word to "fort up," and to curtail the trading
of arms and ammunition to the Utes. And not all Utes were united in the controversy. In March
1854 Young sent major E.A. Bedell, the federal Indian agent, to meet with Wakara and other Ute
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leaders. Bedell was to inquire if they would treat with Young for the sale of their land. During the
meeting with Bedell, Wakara stated that "he would prefer not to sell if he could live peacefully
with the white people which he was anxious to do."
In May, Young and several other Mormon Church leaders and their families went on a tour of
southern Mormon settlements. Presents were sent to Wakara and arrangements made for him
and other Ute leaders to meet Young and his party at Chicken Creek. The issue of Mormon
occupation of Ute lands was not settled; however, Wakara agreed to peace. The treaty was
never formalized by federal government action, but Wakara kept his word. He died of
pneumonia on 28 January 1855. The story of his body being buried with his goods, including
horses and young Indian slaves, has become the stuff of legend.
See: Conway B. Sonne, World of Wakara, (1962); and Gustive O. Larson, "Wakara's Half
Century," The Western Humanities Review 16 (1962).
Tina Kelley and Kathryn L. MacKay
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Reading 6: Chief Walker
NATIVE AMERICAN LEGENDS
Title: Walkara - Walker War Leader
Author: Kathy Weiser
Chief Colorow Ignacio Ouray Walkara, also known as Wakara or Walker, was born about 1808,
along the Spanish Fork River in what is now Utah, one of five sons of a chief of the Timpanogo
band. Described as being over six feet tall and extremely strong, he was a successful warrior
from a young age. His piercing eyes earned him the nickname "Hawk of the Mountains."
While he was a young man, the Spanish did everything they could to keep the Indians in check
by promoting raids and violence between the tribes.
With language skills that included Spanish, English and several native tongues, he became a
skilled negotiator. Also known for his excellent marksmanship, discipline, and bravery, he quickly
became a leader, gathering a raiding band of warriors from the Great Basin tribes, including
Utes, Paiute and Shoshone.
Attacking ranches and travelers along the Old Spanish Trail between New Mexicoand California,
other tribes feared his reputation to such an extent that they paid him tribute in return for
protection and assistance.
Often wearing yellow face paint, he became known as a great horse thief, stealing some 3,000
horses in southern California in the 1840’s. Mountain men, James Beckwourth and Thomas
"Pegleg" Smith were known to trade with Walkara, providing the band with whiskey in return for
horses.
In 1845 Justice of the Peace and assistant for Indian Affairs in Riverside County, California,
Benjamin Davis Wilson, ordered that Walkara and his marauders be tracked down and brought
to justice, but he had no success.
By the time that the Mormons began to settle central Utah, Walkara had become the chief of his
Ute band who were, at first, helpful and cooperative with the Mormons.
However, when the Mormons began to attempt to suppress New Mexican trade, tensions
developed with the Ute, who had long depended on the trade, especially that of native slaves, to
which the Mormons strongly objected. Though Brigham Young had negotiated a trading
relationship with Chief Walkara in 1850, the colonists began to interfere in many of the Ute
transactions. At the same time, the area was being traveled more and more with non-Mormon
trading expeditions and settlers and in a few isolated instances, some Ute Indians were killed.
These tensions soon led to theWalker War, where Walkara led a number of Ute raids against
the Mormon outposts.
Walker War ended through negotiations between Young and Walkara during the winter of 1853.
Casualties during the war equaled about twelve white settlers and an estimated equal amount of
Indians. Some of those coming in the most cited incident, the Fountain Green Massacre, when
on October 1, 1853, members of the Ute tribe killed four men encamped at Uinta Springs. Eight
Utes were murdered in Nephi Utah in revenge of the massacre. The next summer after the
conflict ended, about 120 of Walkara’s tribe were baptized as Mormons.
Although immediate hostilities ended between the Mormons and the Utes, the underlying
conflicts were not resolved and isolated incidents of violence continued until Walkara's death in
1855 at Meadow Creek, Utah.
© Kathy Weiser/Legends of America, updated March, 2014.
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Reading 7: Mock Trial Flow
Opening Statements
• Prosecution
• Defense
Important:
• Short, organized, and convincing
• State the outcome you want
• (Prosecution) Explain how you will meet the burden of proof
• No loose ends
• Strong and focused
Direct Examination and Cross-Examination
• Prosecution calls a witness
• Witness takes the oath
• State name
• Ask questions
• Focus is on the witness, not the attorney
• Open ended questions
• Defense can cross-examine the witness
• Make the other side’s arguments look weak
• Focused (control the information)
• Clarify and try to get extra information
• Stick to facts, not opinion
• Focus on attorney
• Prosecution can call other witness
• Defense can cross-examine
• Defense calls witness and prosecution cross-examines
Closing Arguments
Prosecution
• Time for the “wow”
• Leave with a “so-what,” this is your last word
• Connect to opening statements
• State what you have proved
• Refer back to evidence
Defense
Prosecution gets another (optional) chance to speak
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Reading 8: Court Roles
Prosecuting attorneys (4)
• Opening statement
• Direct examination
• Cross-examination
• Closing arguments
Defense attorneys (4)
• Opening statement
• Direct examination
• Cross-examination
• Closing arguments
Plantiff (prosecution): Chief Walker (1)
• Witness
• Work with the prosecuting attorneys
Defendant: Brigham Young (1)
• Witness
• Work with the defense attorneys
Prosecution witnesses (4)
• Work with the prosecuting attorneys
• Familiarize yourself with your role
Defense witnesses (4)
• Work with the defense attorneys
• Familiarize yourself with your role
Judge (1)
• Listen (but don’t be a pain)
• Familiarize yourself with the case and other cases like it
• Research court language
• Stay impartial (don’t be biased)
Jury (5)
• Familiarize yourself with the case and other cases like it
• Stay impartial (don’t be biased)
• Remember: Innocent until proven guilty
• Be open-minded
• Working with the judge, create a language guide for the attorneys
WHEN YOU GET YOUR ROLE:
• Everyone associated with prosecution will get together
• Everyone associated with defense will get together
• Read through the packet
• Additional research
• Decide who the witnesses are (create a history for them)
• You will write the speeches and questions together
• Practice
• The judge and jury will get together
• Read through the packet
• Additional research
• Create a language guide
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• Figure out what you are expected to do during the case