A jury comprised of kindergartners found the Champaign County Municipal Courthouse dog not guilty of eating green eggs and ham during multiple mock trials held last week.
The Champaign County Municipal Court hosted eight groups of kindergartners from Urbana North Elementary School on Thursday and Friday.
Municipal Court Clerk Amy Evans said children were introduced to the court and court staff before serving on a jury in a mock trial for the case of the State of Ohio vs. Copper the Dog.
Copper was charged with eating green eggs and ham before being found not guilty of the charge during all eight trials.
Evans said the court based witnesses and questions around the book “Green Eggs and Ham” by Dr. Seuss.
Evans said this is the first year the court has held an event such as this.
“We know every year the kids tour the police department, the fire department and some other branches of government,” Evans said. “Our bailiff Carl Bader actually used to do the kindergarten tours when he was an officer with the city of Urbana so that’s kind of how he wanted to get back into doing that.”
Judge Gil S. Weithman presided over the trial, Municipal Court Prosecutor Jared Chamberlain served as the prosecutor for the case and Copper was represented by attorney Kirk Ellis.
Witnesses included Champaign County Municipal Court bailiffs Bader and Kip Michael as well as Urbana Police Lt. Josh Jacobs.
