Mock Trial is a club that mimics a court trial, complete with witnesses, prosecutors and more. Though not every Mock Trial student is interested in the law, several are, as demonstrated by the club’s president Pan Qi, who said she hopes to become a lawyer. For those students, Cuyahoga County Assistant County Prosecutor Jose Torres has some advice.
“I encourage any students [interested in law] to… see what opportunities [are] there for shadowing or clerking, so they have experience and [can] connect with people,” Torres said. “It’s not just knowing the law [and] what the office does, but it’s [also] very important to create a network with the people in the office so [that] whenever you want to go into that career, you already know somebody there.”
As an Assistant County Prosecutor, Torres deals with a lot of cases involving drug abuse and violence. His responsibilities extend from reviewing evidence for cases to making sure that addicts move through the appropriate rehabilitation system.
In Cuyahoga County, White Light Behavioral Health states that there are roughly 1.2 million illegal drug users in Ohio as of the year 2020– that means people who are using illegal drugs like heroin and methamphetamine. About 35.9 out of 100,000 people died of drug use in 2023. Teens in Ohio are 4.2% less prone to drug use than the national average for teenagers, yet they show a 5.65% higher chance of alcohol consumption compared to the national average. And in the department of violent crime, according to Axios, homicides in Cleveland are down 43% in 2024 compared to 2023, a contrast to the high point they reached in 2020. Cleveland homicides reportedly surged during the pandemic, with over 150 in each year from 2020-2023. These are the numbers that become a part of Torres’s job.
Mock Trial senior Alyssa Rhee, who is interested in forensics and the legal system, said she’d like to know how much of an attorney’s time is spent in court compared to the office.
Torres said that he divides time between reviewing cases and being in court, but Saturdays are always court days.
“I will usually handle everybody that gets arrested the day before or two days before,” Torres said. “For serious crimes, they’ll be brought to court for the court to set a bond and decide whether they need a preliminary hearing or not. I’m the prosecutor handling all those cases, and I decide what to request and what to do with them. It could be anything from somebody stealing a car to aggravated murder.”
Torres works with cases of people who got arrested up to two days before he sees the case because every person who is arrested for a felony is entitled to have a hearing within the next 48 hours. But despite the exigency of these cases, he’s found a suitable work-life balance for himself.
“I don’t talk about my cases at home,” Torres said. “I don’t waste time handling things that have no relevancy to what I’m doing. So, I am able to do my job within the time that I have. Therefore, [I have] a lot of time outside of the office… I don’t bring work to interfere with my family time.”
Mock Trial president and senior Pan Qi said she wonders what would motivate someone to become an attorney. She said that going through the process of law school is a lot of work, so she likes to ask about what gives someone the drive to take it on.
For Torres, it was a combination of interests.
“I’ve always liked [it]- it’s a combination of the law, history, justice– those were… topics that I [have] always loved, and so I tried to do all of that,” Torres said.
History is a major area of interest for Torres. While he doesn’t let his work life affect his enjoyment of his time at home, history is something that he is really passionate about. He enjoys historical reenactments of battles from the past, and has even created his own ornate armor. A helmet and breastplate are on full display in his living room, a burnished golden color with stunningly detailed patterns in a historically accurate style. His horse, Cuba, is his loyal companion at these events.
“History is not just Napoleon or Washington, history is basically what has happened in the past,” he said. “And usually, for criminal law, a good determination of what’s going to happen in the future is [the past].”
When it comes to history’s influence on modern court cases, Torres said that there are certain cases from the past whose precedents must be followed. The word for that is jurisprudence. Apart from that, he must also consider the history of each individual case, such as whether or not the person arrested has committed a crime before, and if they are likely to do it again in the future.
In the end, being an attorney can get quite involved, but as Torres has shown, it doesn’t need to interfere with life at home. He still finds time for things he enjoys, like historical reenactments, cooking and playing with his dogs and his horse. His ultimate advice for students seeking to follow a path into law is to get experience.
“That’s the best way to know whether it’s the career for you or not,” Torres said.
