Peter Vickery, QC, sat down and wrote what he probably intended to be a whimsical and romantic letter to a beautiful young woman. Referencing the Hollywood film Avatar, of which he was much enamoured, he asked Lisa* out on a date.
“I have heard of a nice bar just down from the ‘Tree of Life’ on the planet Pandora in the solar system of Alpha Centauri A, southern constellation Centaurus, Milky Way,” he wrote.
Peter Vickery, QC, has been named as the retired Supreme Court judge who allegedly sexually harassed two young female associates.Credit:The Age
“Are you by chance free on 31 May 2154, say about 7pm Greenwich mean time?”
To seal the deal, he included one of his poems, titled Virgil’s Verse, accompanied by a reproduction of Italian master Caravaggio’s Amor Vincit Omnia (Love is Triumphant).
If I am not made for you in this world/I will find you in another
Look up to the vast night sky/Starlight from Alpha Centauri journeys to Earth
A thing of great beauty, glittering of you/Nunc scio quit sit amor [now I know what love is].
This was no letter between lovers, as the tone might suggest. Peter Vickery was a Victorian Supreme Court judge, highly respected in his field of commercial law and with a glittering career stretching decades behind him.
Lisa was his associate, some 40 years his junior, and in her second job out of university. Throughout her time working for Mr Vickery, she became increasingly uncomfortable with his behaviour towards her, believing it to be “overly sexualised”. He regularly told her she was beautiful, she said. But this was something else.
Mr Vickery included an image of Caravaggio’s Amor Vincit Omnia (Love is Triumphant) in a letter to one of his associates.Credit:AP/Van Gogh Museum
When Lisa read the letter, she experienced a panic attack.
“I froze,” she later told barrister Kate Eastman, SC.
“My pulse went through the roof and my hands started shaking. I thought I was going to throw up. Everything went quiet and I was just terrified. I wanted to cry but could not because I was at work. I did not know what to do. I was absolutely paralysed with fear. I did not want to go on a date with him and I did not know what to do…
“I was so worried that if I rejected him, my career would be over. Everything I had worked so hard for would be lost because of this. I had not done anything to encourage this beyond doing my job and being pleasant.”
Lisa was not the only associate to have had concerns about Mr Vickery’s behaviour.
Another woman, Janet*, who worked with Mr Vickery previously, said he had put his hand between her thighs in the back seat of a car and kissed her on the lips.
Years after leaving the Supreme Court, Lisa and Janet read about Dyson Heydon. Mr Heydon was a former High Court Justice who, it emerged in June 2020, stood accused of the long-running and persistent sexual harassment of female associates and colleagues.
An investigation upheld allegations he had sexually harassed six of his young female associates. One of his associates later said she had left the law because “the culture was broken from the top down”.
An investigation commissioned by the Victorian Supreme Court and completed late last month upheld the allegations of Lisa and Janet against Mr Vickery, finding he subjected them to unwelcome conduct of a sexual nature and unfavourable treatment in their employment because they were women.
Both Mr Heydon and Mr Vickery deny any wrongdoing, although in an online letter, Mr Vickery extended his “sincere apologies to both [complainants] for any distress unknowingly caused”.
How could these men – charged with the power to fine corporations, incarcerate people and influence the future practice of law by creating legal precedents – seemingly be so out of touch with community standards and sentiment?
A 2019 survey commissioned by the Victorian Legal Services Board and Commissioner found 61 per cent of women working in law had experienced sexual harassment, compared with 39 per cent of women in the broader workforce.
The law – with its hierarchical power structures (it is not frequently called a “fraternity” for nothing), adversarial systems, rarefied traditions and emphasis on networking and reputation – can leave some women unable or unwilling to speak out.
In a statement, the Women Barristers’ Association said its members were “deeply troubled, but unfortunately unsurprised” to read the revelations in The Age about the investigation into complaints about Mr Vickery.
“The WBA recognises that existing power structures in legal practice and the justice system make it especially difficult for people to complain when things go wrong. And the impact on their careers and wellbeing can be devastating.”
In 2020, Court Chief Justice Anne Ferguson and former attorney-general Jill Hennessy commissioned a review into sexual harassment within the state’s legal profession.
That review, led by Helen Szoke, made 20 recommendations including the establishment of a formal internal complaints process, including independent investigations, into wrongdoing and changes to the working arrangements for roles such as judges’ associates, so they have different people they can report to.
Responding to the Vickery report, Chief Justice Ferguson said the behaviour described in the report should never have happened.
“This unacceptable behaviour must stop,” she said. “Apologies are not enough. The responsibility to change culture and put measures in place to stop it happening lies with us.”
The Law Institute of Victoria will next week launch its Advocates for Change initiative, which aims to eliminate sexual harassment in the legal profession.
*Not their real names
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