A mock trial is an excellent way to engage a student’s critical thinking skills, and persuasive writing skills, and challenge their knowledge of a sequence of events. In Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, several violent deaths occur and at the end of the play it’s ambiguous who will be punished and how. Therefore, to engage students in the play, they can play judge, jury, and lawyers in a trial to answer the question: was Friar Laurence guilty of performing an illegal marriage?