Vicarious trauma in the judicial workplace: state liability for judicial psychiatric injury in Australia

Abstract

There is developing, yet strong, evidence that judicial officers are seriously affected by exposure to traumatic material. The risk and prevalence of psychiatric injury to judges is now increasingly recognised. In the light of growing recognition by the High Court of Australia of the likelihood of psychiatric harm arising in people whose work exposes them to traumatic material in Kozarov v Victoria ('Kozarov'), we investigate through legal analysis the possibility that judicial officers may be entitled to compensation for such harm. This might seem straightforward after the High Court decided in Kozarov that the State was liable in negligence for trauma-related psychiatric injury to an employee lawyer caused in the court-related work environment. We argue in this article that, while there are strong arguments which support liability in negligence for judicial officers as non-employees, nevertheless such claims will be complex and will face a range of hurdles and barriers including those arising from judicial independence and judicial immunity.

Keywords: PTSD; judges; judicial officers; magistrates; negligence; psychiatric injury; vicarious trauma; workplace stress.