Morris (a pseudonym) v Unknown

[2025] VCC 1450

IN THE COUNTY COURT OF VICTORIA

AT MELBOURNE

COMMON LAW DIVISION

Revised
Not Restricted
 Suitable for Publication

APPEALS AND POST SENTENCE APPLICATIONS LIST

KRISTA MORRIS (A PSEUDONYM)	Appellant
v
“JESS UNKNOWN”	Respondent

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JUDGE:	HIS HONOUR JUDGE PILLAY
WHERE HELD:	Melbourne
DATE OF HEARING:	25 September 2025
DATE OF JUDGMENT:	23 October 2025
CASE MAY BE CITED AS:	Morris (a pseudonym) v Unknown
MEDIUM NEUTRAL CITATION:	[2025] VCC 1450

REASONS FOR JUDGMENT
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Subject:Appeal against Magistrates’ refusal to grant a final personal safety intervention order

Catchwords:              Personal safety intervention order – review of decision of Magistrate – respondent is unknown and cannot be identified – legal, factual or discretionary error

Legislation Cited:      Personal Safety Intervention Orders Act2010 (Vic); Interpretation of Legislation Act 1984 (Vic)

Cases Cited:Whisprun Pty Ltd v Dixon (2003) 200 ALR 447; AAA v County Court of Victoria & Ors [2023] VSC 13

Judgment:                  Appeal dismissed

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APPEARANCES:
For the Appellant	In person
For the Respondent	Unknown

HIS HONOUR:

1Ms Morris[1] made an application for a personal safety intervention order against a person who can be called “Jess Unknown”.[2]  The application came before the Melbourne Magistrates’ Court on 2 June 2025.  It was heard by his Honour Magistrate G Lethbridge.  The matter was struck out, on the basis that a personal safety intervention order could not be made against an entity that was unknown.

[1]        A pseudonym.

[2]        This is a fictitious name. The identity of the respondent is in issue. This name has been chosen to reflect

the identification of the respondent by the applicant in her initial application for an intervention order

2That order was certified on 7 July 2025.

3Ms Morris now appeals to this Court.

4By way of background, on 19 August 2024 Ms Morris first applied for, and was granted, an interim intervention order against “Jess Unknown”.  After the making of the interim intervention order, it appears that police attempted to serve it upon “Jess Unknown”.  The basis for the order was Ms Morris’s allegations that she had been stalked, raped, and constantly followed by “Jess Unknown” to three different houses that she lived in.  None of those allegations have ever been tested.  What has been in issue is the identity of who “Jess Unknown” is.

5After the interim intervention order was granted, numerous names for “Jess Unknown” were given by Ms Morris to police.  Her only identifier for “Jess Unknown” was that in the late 1980s “Jess Unknown” was a student at Collingwood Secondary College where Ms Morris was a teacher.[3]  Ms Morris accepted, before the Magistrate, that police have simply not been able to serve “Jess Unknown” at the address given to them by Ms Morris, or have not been able to identify “Jess Unknown” through any of the other names that Ms Morris suggests she could have been, and might still be, going by.[4]

[3]Transcript (“T”) 4, Line (“L”) 6-8

[4]T5, L13-15

6Similarly, after his Honour Magistrate Lethbridge struck out the intervention order application when it came before him, and Ms Morris lodged an appeal, the appeal documents have not been able to be served by Victoria Police on “Jess Unknown”.  A Certificate of Inability to Serve was filed by Victoria Police on 8 July 2025.

7The basis for his Honour striking out the application for a final intervention order can be summed up by his Honour’s words:

“Ms Morris, this is not to be critical of you in any way, it is simply stating a forensic reality.  You cannot have an order against an unknown person.”[5]

[5]T6, L13-15

8He went on:

“Ms Morris, there is something called the Personal Safety Intervention Orders Act.  That regulates the powers that a court has to make orders.  It sets out certain tests and certain criteria that must be met.  As I’ve said to you, in the absence of a proper identification of the respondent, the court cannot make final orders.”[6]

[6]T7, L18-24

9Ms Morris filed her grounds of appeal on 13 June 2025 and submissions in support of her grounds on 30 September 2025.

10Dealing with each of the grounds of appeal.  First, Ms Morris submits that his Honour struck out her matter when she failed to appear at 9:30am.  Not much turns on this.  Ms Morris failed to appear at 9:30am, but rather appeared at 2:00pm.  By that stage, due to her non-appearance, his Honour had struck out her matter.  However, when she did appear at 2:00pm, his Honour asked her for an explanation for her earlier non-attendance and then reinstated her matter so that she could argue her case.  This shows the Magistrate was willing to, and did, entertain her application on the day that it was listed.  The striking-out of the matter for non-appearance in the Magistrates’ Court is no more than usual practice; particularly so where there had been no prior express communication to the Court, and a response from it, as to whether the matter would in fact be listed at 2:00pm.   In any event, it does not matter, because his Honour was prepared to reinstate the matter and hear it instanter.

11Second, Ms Morris submits that his Honour overturned rulings of previous Magistrates who had issued intervention orders.  That ground cannot be made good, because his Honour was in fact hearing the final intervention order application.  Preceding Magistrates had only ever granted interim intervention orders, which operate until such time as the final hearing.  His Honour was doing no more than hearing the final application.  He was not engaged in overturning rulings of previous Magistrates at all.

12Third, Ms Morris now wishes to make an application for a substitution order.  She indicates that she would have made such an application before his Honour, but did not feel able to.  I would reject that submission.  His Honour asked, fairly, how Ms Morris put her case, and explained to her the difficulties associated with her case if she could not identify a person who the order could attach to and prohibit from behaving in the manner Ms Morris alleged.  This was no more than pointing out the requirements of the Act.  It is the case that an appeal point cannot be raised on appeal if it has not been raised below.[7]

[7]Whisprun Pty Ltd v Dixon (2003) 200 ALR 447; AAA v County Court of Victoria & Ors [2023] VSC 13

13There is no substance to this ground, as his Honour gave Ms Morris adequate opportunity to be heard, and she did not raise this point.  There was no procedural unfairness in the way the hearing was conducted, nor was she shut out from raising any points.

14Even if I were wrong about the above, and there could be demonstrated some legal, factual, or discretionary error in his Honour’s conduct of the proceeding or ultimate finding,[8] I would still dismiss this appeal.  This is for the following reason.

[8]        AAA v County Court of Victoria & Ors [2023] VSC 13

15Section 61(1) of the Personal Safety Intervention Orders Act 2010 specifies that a court only has the power to make a final order “if the court is satisfied, on the balance of probabilities, that –

(a) the respondent has—

(i) committed prohibited behaviour against the affected person and—

(A) is likely to continue to do so or do so again; and

(B) the respondent's prohibited behaviour would cause a reasonable  person to fear for his or her safety; or

(ii) stalked the affected person and is likely to continue to do so or do so again…”

16Pausing there, and focusing on the Court’s power.  The Court may only make an order if it is satisfied that the respondent has committed one of the designated behaviours. The term “respondent” is defined in the Act as “a person ...”. There is no definition of the term “person” in the Act. Section 38 of the Interpretation of Legislation Act  defines “person” in the following terms:

“person includes a body politic or corporate as well as an individual”.[9]

[9]        Interpretation of Legislation Act 1984 s38

17The result of that definition is that, for an order to be made, the respondent would have to be “a body politic or corporate as well as an individual”. The order simply cannot be made against an entity titled “Jess Unknown”, because that entity is neither a body politic, or corporate entity or an individual. 

18In that circumstance, the Court has no power under the Personal Safety Intervention Orders Act to make an order.  As such, there is no merit to this appeal, and it must be dismissed.

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