Victim Impact Statement Example: Workplace Bullying and Harassment

This is a fictional example of a victim impact statement written after sustained workplace bullying and harassment. It follows the ten sections used in the Justice Draft guided template.

In this example, Priya was bullied and harassed by her manager for almost two years. The behaviour escalated to stalking and threats outside work, which is what led to criminal charges.

On its own, workplace bullying is not usually a criminal offence in Australia. Charges tend to arise when the behaviour includes stalking, threats, assault or sexual offences. Victoria goes further, and serious workplace bullying can be prosecuted there under stalking laws, often called Brodie's Law.

If there are no criminal charges, you may still need to describe the impact of bullying in other processes, such as a workers compensation claim, a Fair Work stop bullying application or a discrimination complaint. Those processes have their own rules and forms, but the ten sections below can still help you organise what happened and what it did to you.

If you are being bullied at work right now, this may be hard to read. Go gently, and remember that what is happening to you is not your fault.

Victim Impact Statement of Priya Nair

This is a fictional example created by Justice Draft. All names, people and events are invented.

How I felt at the time

This did not happen on one day. It happened in small ways, five days a week, for almost two years. My manager criticised my work in front of the whole team and called it feedback. He gave me deadlines he knew I could not meet, then emailed the whole office when I missed them. He left me out of meetings I needed to attend and told people I was difficult. For a long time I did not have a word for what was happening. I thought I was failing. I would sit in my car before work trying to slow my breathing, and I shook in the bathroom after meetings more times than I can count.

Then it followed me out of the office. Messages at night from numbers I did not know. My manager waiting near my car after late finishes. Being followed part of the way home. The night I realised the car behind me had made the same four turns I had, I understood this was never about my work.

Emotional wellbeing

I had my first panic attack at my desk on a Tuesday morning. I thought I was having a heart attack. My GP referred me to a psychologist, and I have been seeing her for over a year. I was on medication for anxiety for a time. The hardest damage to explain is what it did to how I see myself. Two years of being told I was the problem rewired me. I apologise for things that are not my fault. I triple check work I know is right. In my new job my manager is kind, and I still flinch when she asks if I have a minute.

Relationships

My partner Sam watched me disappear a little at a time. I came home empty and spent evenings replaying conversations, drafting emails in my head, or crying. Sam never stopped listening, but it took a toll on us both. I hid it from my parents for a year because I did not want to worry them, and hiding something that big changes how honest you can be about everything else. I lost most of my work friendships. People saw what was happening and looked away. I understand they were scared for their own jobs, but it still hurt. One colleague gave a statement to police. I will be grateful to her for the rest of my life.

Physical health

For most of those two years I barely slept. I had migraines every week and my jaw ached from clenching it. My stomach problems got so bad I was referred to a specialist, who found nothing wrong except stress. I caught every cold going around because I was so run down. Since leaving, my body has slowly settled, but the insomnia comes back before every court date, and the panic attacks have not fully gone.

Financial impact

I resigned without another job to go to, because I could not survive another month there. I was out of work for four months. The job I found is a step down from the role I had worked years to reach, and it pays less, but it is safe. My workers compensation claim for psychological injury was accepted, but the process took months and meant retelling everything to strangers. Between the gap in income, the pay cut and the psychology sessions beyond what Medicare covers, this has cost us tens of thousands of dollars. It also cost me the career path I was on, and I do not know how to put a number on that.

Daily life and routine

I still check my phone with dread, even though the messages stopped when he was charged. I avoid the suburb where the old office is, which means I no longer shop at the centre I used to go to every week. I park under lights and I look around before I walk to my car, every single time. At work I over prepare for every meeting, because being caught out was once dangerous. Sunday nights are still hard. My body learned that Monday was coming, and it has not fully unlearned it.

Sense of safety

Being followed home changed how I feel about every space I am in. We moved apartments last year, partly for a fresh start and partly because I could not relax knowing he might know where we lived. I still check the rear view mirror more than I need to. Our industry is small, and I think about running into him at an event or an interview. When his name comes into my mind, my stomach still drops the way it did when it appeared in my inbox.

Spiritual and cultural wellbeing

Shame kept me away from the people and places that usually hold me up. I stopped going to family gatherings because I could not pretend to be okay, and pretending was all I had the energy for. I was raised to believe that if you work hard and treat people well, workplaces will treat you fairly. Losing that belief shook something deep in me. My family has helped me start rebuilding it, one family celebration at a time.

Who I was before this happened

Before this job I was confident and ambitious. I was the first person in my family to finish university, and I was proud of the career I was building. I mentored the juniors on my team. I put my hand up for everything. I laughed easily and I believed the best of people. That version of me is coming back in small pieces, but she has been gone a long time, and I grieve for the years I spent doubting her.

What I want the court or assessor to know

People hear the word bullying and think of something that belongs in a schoolyard. What happened to me was deliberate, patient and sustained, and it continued after I found the courage to report it. Reporting was the hardest thing I have ever done, and for a long time it only made things worse.

I want the court to know that this took almost everything from me. My health, my confidence, my career path, my savings and nearly two years of my life. I am rebuilding all of it from the ground up.

I ask the court to order that he have no contact with me in any form. And I ask for a sentence that says clearly that this behaviour is criminal. For almost two years I was told it was a personality clash. This court is the first place with the power to call it what it is.