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TSIRAGAKIS v MALLET
|Beach, Kennedy and Kaye JJA
77 VR 324
TSIRAGAKIS v MALLET Court of AppealBeach, Kennedy and Kaye JJA 28 May, 17 June 2025[2025] VSCA 134Negligence — Duty of care — Psychiatric injury — Attempted suicide by employee — Co-worker Witnessed aftermath of attempted suicide — Employee who had attempted suicide no longer at scene of incident — Whether employee attempting suicide owed duty of care to co-worker to take reasonable care to avoid co-worker sustaining psychiatric injury from witnessing the aftermath of the attempt — County Court Civil Procedure Rules 2018 (Vic), r 47.04.
T sued her employer and M, a co-worker, for negligence, seeking damages for psychiatric injury sustained as a result of attending the scene of an incident after M had attempted suicide by driving her motor vehicle into a power pole. The parties agreed to the trial, on agreed facts only, of a preliminary question of whether M owed T a duty of care. The trial judge held that T had not established that M owed her a duty of care and dismissed the proceeding as against M. T sought leave to appeal.