About 30 people, aged between 15 and 17 years old, faced the Queanbeyan Local Court on Friday on charges relating to driving under the influence of alcohol, and driving with illicit drugs.
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Fortunately, it was a mock trial.
It was an idea brought about by Queanbeyan Magistrate Michael Antrum, who was fed up with seeing young people on similar charges being funnelled through his court.
In December last year, one third of drivers who were randomly tested for drugs in Queanbeyan tested positive to either cannabis or methamphetamine.
While there are no statistics on how many of these were young people, Magistrate Antrum believes they are one of the main groups learning the consequences of their actions too late – when they're in court.
He has taken matters into his own hands, particularly on the issue of driving under the influence of illicit drugs.
With the increased drug-driving testing, or the "lick-a-stick", he said the burden was falling to the courts to impose a penalty on offenders.
"We've got scores of people coming in who are all surprised to find out that the joint they had on Saturday is still kicking around in their metabolism seven days later," he said. "I don't think a lot of people know that."
"It is one thing to bang the desk and punish people, but the community is not served by just dishing out huge punishments all the time," Magistrate Antrum said.
He said often the best outcome was to have the offender linked up with courses for education.
"A little bit of knowledge goes a long way, and sometimes the court is a useful gateway for them to go and get that assistance."
However, Magistrate Antrum said he didn't think that was the best system.
"It's not for me to pronounce policy or the law, but it would be, I think, very beneficial for particularly younger people to learn from somewhere other than standing in a courtroom that this is what happens."
"My sense is a lot of people aren't aware of that residual factor of illicit drugs remaining in the system."
To help combat the drastic rise in people being caught with illicit drugs in their system, Magistrate Antrum pitched an education initiative where he hosted a mock court, "so they can see what happens when you get busted".
Karabar High School year 10 student Caitlin Oats, 15, played the role of the solicitor during one of the mock trials, representing a person who was caught driving under the influence of alcohol.
"I do want to be a solicitor, so it is a dream … Daunting, but it was a good experience," Miss Oats said.
Her commerce teacher, Mark Mortensen, said the lessons learnt would be shared through their peer groups and hopefully taken on board.
"I can teach the students about the law, we can talk about crime and consequences and we can take them to the law courts to see cases … But at the end of the day they have to make that final decision," he said.
"[The mock court] is incredibly beneficial. This is another way we can help make sure that it's going to be of benefit to our students in their future lives," Mr Mortensen said.
