Court of Appeal Online Learning Resource

There are 13 judges in the Court of Appeal, including the Chief Justice. The Court maintains a list of current Supreme Court judicial officers.

Find out who is currently serving on the Court of Appeal.

The Court of Appeal can usually hear applications and appeals in criminal proceedings from: 

• Someone convicted and sentenced in the Supreme Court, County Court or Magistrates' Court constituted by the Chief Magistrate, and they want to appeal against the conviction, sentence or both. In most cases you need the Court's permission to have these appeals heard. This is called leave to appeal.
• The Director of Public Prosecutions against a sentence imposed in the Supreme Court, County Court or Magistrates' Court constituted by the Chief Magistrate. These are also called Crown appeals. They do not need leave to appeal.
• Any party against some interlocutory decisions made by a trial judge during a criminal proceeding in the Supreme Court or County Court. These all need leave to appeal. You must have first applied to the trial judge for them to certify the interlocutory appeal. 

Learn more about criminal appeals.

In relation to civil proceedings, the Court of Appeal can generally hear applications and appeals from orders made: 

• By a judge in the Trial Division of the Supreme Court of Victoria.
• By a judge in the County Court of Victoria.
• By an associate judge in the Trial Division of the Supreme Court of Victoria, if the matter was referred to them by a judge under rule 77.05 of the Supreme Court (General Civil Procedure) Rules 2025 or rule 16.1(3) of the Supreme Court (Corporations) Rules 2023.
• By an associate judge in the Trial Division, if the judgment or order was made at the trial of a proceeding under one of the following:
  • Part 3.2 or Part 3.3 of Chapter 3 of the Relationships Act 2008
  • sections 49, 84, 85 or Part IV of the Property Law Act 1958
  • recovery of land under Order 53 of the Supreme Court (General Civil Procedure) Rules 2025
  • Part I and Part IV of the Administration and Probate Act 1958
  • Part IV of the Trustee Act 1958 (but not if the associate judge is, or was performing the duties of, the Senior Master in respect of money or assets held or to be held on behalf of a person under disability)
  • section 90(3) of the Transfer of Land Act 1958; or
  • sections 9 or 31 of the Wills Act 1997.
• In a company's application under sections 459G of the Corporations Act 2001 to set aside a statutory demand.
• By the Chief Magistrate of the Magistrates' Court.
• By the President or a Vice President of the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (VCAT).

Learn more about civil appeals.

Explore the following resources presented by the former Chief Justice Anne Ferguson and President Karin Emerton: 

• About the Court of Appeal
• What is an appeal?
• The appeals process
• The role of the President of the Court of Appeal

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Learn more about the Supreme Court including the cases we hear, our judges and why we are a Court for all Victorians at how the Court works.

The Court sits throughout the year, but with minimal listings over the Christmas and New Year period. 

The Supreme Court produces a daily hearing list of all matters heard each day, with information available for the following day's proceedings from approximately 4pm. Each listing includes the time and location where the matter is being heard. 

In person: The Court of Appeal is located at 459 Lonsdale Street in Melbourne. It's courtrooms (Blue, Green and Red) are in a heritage building, formerly the Crown Law Officers. Members of the public are welcome to visit the Court.  See further information on court locations and attending Court.

Public live streams: Some proceedings, including hearings, judgments and sentences are available for public viewing via livestream. See further information at public live streams of court hearings.

On-demand: Watch recordings of proceedings, judgments and sentences online in the Court of Appeal Proceedings multimedia on demand section. Learn more about the work of the Supreme Court of Victoria in our series of video and illustrated explainers.

The Court of Appeal: Behind the scenes

(Chief Justice Ferguson) Hello. I'm Anne Ferguson, the Chief Justice of the Victorian Supreme Court. The Court of Appeal is the highest court in Victoria. People who consider a decision in their case in the Supreme or County Court was wrong can apply to have that decision reviewed by the Court of Appeal. The Court of Appeal considers each side's arguments and determines whether the law was applied correctly.

There are a number of judges in the Court of Appeal, including the president of the Court of Appeal and the Chief Justice. The judges have significant legal knowledge and experience, and their published judgments stand as important legal precedents guiding decision making across all levels of the justice system in Victoria. It's a busy court. In an average year, many hundreds of criminal and civil appeals and applications are heard. 

There is no automatic right to appeal. Leave to appeal is required. This is designed to ensure that applications without merit are refused at an early stage. Appeals are usually heard by three Judges. Judgments are unanimous or decided by majority if there is disagreement. In practice, and unless an application for leave has no obvious merit, an application for leave is determined at the same time as the appeal is heard.

If the Court of Appeal allows the appeal, that is, if the judges find there was a legal error, the appeal judges can order that the case be reheard by the court or tribunal, which made the original decision, or the appeal judges can go on to decide the case themselves. If the decision that the accused was guilty is overturned, the Court of Appeal may quash the conviction and order a new trial, acquit the person or substitute a conviction on an alternative offense that was opened to the jury. If the sentence imposed on a convicted person is too high, the Court of Appeal may reduce the penalty. 

The Director of Public Prosecutions can also appeal against a sentence on the basis that it is inadequate. The Court of Appeal can impose a higher sentence if it decides there was an error and a different sentence should be imposed.

If the Court of Appeal decides there was no legal error, the appeal will be dismissed and the original decision stands. If a party believes there was an error made by the Court of Appeal, they can apply to the High Court of Australia.

How does the Court of Appeal operate? 

(Justice Emerton) Hello, I’m Justice Emerton, President of the Court of Appeal.

In the Court of Appeal, Judges and their staff are assisted by judicial registrars, registry lawyers and registry officers. It's easiest to describe these roles by explaining the appeal process. To begin an appeal, a party must file their appeal papers with the Court of Appeal Registry. Both criminal and civil appeal legislation requires parties to file detailed written submissions, setting out their arguments. These are known as written cases and they help speed up the hearing and determination of appeals. 

The registry lawyers and officers assess the documents to ensure they satisfy all the necessary requirements. Registry lawyers at the central contact point with the parties ensuring written cases and supporting documentation are filed in line with established timelines. All matters in the Court of Appeal are case managed by a judicial registrar and registry lawyers rather than by the judges who hear the matters.

Once the parties have filed their written cases and a list of previously decided cases and any documents or other material they wish to rely on, a judicial registrar lists the matter to be heard. If there are preliminary issues involved, a judicial registrar holds a mention hearing to resolve them. In a way, the judicial registrar acts as the Court's coordinator managing cases to ensure they are heard promptly. Once a matter is referred to the judges to determine, they are assisted by their associates and chambers staff who manage the courtroom and help with drafting orders and undertaking legal research.

If you are interested in joining the Court of Appeal, which I would recommend. There are roles for all levels of experience and legal training.

Meet our judges

(Justice Maxwell) I'm Chris Maxwell and I've been on the court for nearly 17 years. 

(Justice Kennedy) I'm Marie Kennedy. I'm one of the Court of Appeal judges and I joined the Court of Appeal at the end of 2020 after being a trial judge for many years.

(Justice Kyrou) I'm Emilios Kyrou. I'm also on the Court of Appeal. I was appointed to the Court of Appeal in 2014 after serving in the trial division for six years, since 2008. 

(Justice Kennedy) I always wanted to be a barrister, maybe all that debating at school. So after leaving school I went to Monash University. I studied economics and law. I then served what we used to call articles, which is a year in a big firm.

I got to the bar in 1990 and I did everything in those days, perhaps not as specialized as it is now. So I did crime, I did admin law, I did anything that came my way. After about four or five years, I sort of settled more into public law and commercial law. 

(Justice Maxwell) And Marie, when did the idea that you might become a judge first loom on your horizon?

(Justice Kennedy) Probably not until around that time, because nobody in my family had even been to university. So I was the first person to do all this. So we had no connections in the law, which is good for those who are watching, who are in that boat, I hope. Probably around that time I started to think that a different role might be interesting to be the decision maker rather than the advocate.

(Justice Maxwell) And Emilios. Your pathway wasn't as an advocate. How did it come about for you? 

(Justice Kyrou) I was a solicitor, a partner of a large firm, Mallesons Stephen Jaques. The pathway of a solicitor to judge is not very usual at all. In fact, I was the second practicing solicitor in Victoria to be appointed directly to the Supreme Court. 

(Justice Maxwell) Can you talk about your background?

(Justice Kyrou) Yes, I was born in Greece. I came to Australia when I was eight and a half years old, couldn't speak English. A typical sort of migrant experience. Discrimination, some bullying, racism. When I was growing up, I decided I wanted to be a lawyer. When I was about 12 to 14, because my parents didn't speak English, I would do all the interpreting for them in all sorts of contexts, including when they had a dispute with a retailer or a faulty good, etc.

So I became their advocate and I realized growing up in that sort of environment that the best way to protect yourself and your family was to know the law. So I decided to be a lawyer at that young age, and sort of set my sights on studying hard and getting into university and then doing well in passing and then getting into a good firm.

So I was appointed to the trial division in 2008, and after six years as a trial judge, in 2014, I was appointed to the Court of Appeal. We’ve had a very outstanding Court of Appeal judge from academia or solicitors and people with diverse backgrounds, culturally, I think, can only enrich the judiciary and make it more responsive to the community that it serves.

(Justice Kennedy) The decision maker role is a nice contrast after you've been an advocate for one side or the other for so long that you were able to take, as it were, a more balanced approach rather than seeking to persuade of a particular point of view. The trial judge is an exciting role because anything can happen.

(Justice Kyrou) I enjoyed being a trial judge because the facts were in conflict. You had witnesses giving opposing testimony and you have to sift through that, sift through the contemporaneous documents and solve the factual puzzle. I actually enjoyed that. 

(Justice Maxwell) Do you miss that now that you're on the appeal court? 

(Justice Kyrou) I wouldn't say I miss it because on the Court of Appeal, one of the benefits is that we get to decide more legal issues and we get the opportunity to clarify the law. And that's, for me, the most enjoyable aspect of the Court of Appeal role. Also the variety, we do everything, any appeal on any law from the County Court or the trial division, VCAT sometimes, it could be on anything. And within that there are just so many different factual and legal scenarios that we have to resolve. It's never boring in the Court of Appeal. It never was in the trial division either. 

(Justice Maxwell) I didn't have the experience of being a trial judge because, as I said unexpectedly, I came straight to the Court of Appeal. But like Marie, I found, have found the work of adjudication much more satisfying than the work of advocacy. Yes, it's a challenge to develop an argument, to present, to make a point that will favour your client's case, and that's essential work in our profession. But, coming across the road and now having to decide what I thought was the right answer to the question and explain why, I've found richly satisfying and, as I say, much more fun than being an advocate. 

The other thing about the appeal work, I've found, is that in order to answer the particular question in the case, you really need to understand the legal or conceptual framework within which the question arises.

You might have to choose between two competing decisions which are relevant to the case. 

What are your tips for advocates?

(Justice Kennedy) Well, I suspect everybody else would agree with this as well. But “prepare, prepare and prepare” would be what I would say. And “prepare” in that you not just prepare to be able to get up and say what you want to say, but actually analyse out the nature of what you're doing. Think about what the other side might be doing. Think about the case from the other side's point of view. Too many barristers, still, it's like a parallel lines type debate. You ought to be able to think about the case from the other side, and in that way you might actually be able to test and show problems with the other side.

I suppose the only other thing I would say is just before you're about to go anywhere, you ought to be able to say what your case is in relatively simple terms, as if you were explaining to your neighbour what the case is about. And if you can't do that, you probably haven't got on top of it. 

(Justice Maxwell) I suppose my tip is keep it simple and keep it short. Most advocacy improves through abbreviation; it rarely gets better by elongation. And Emilios, you've seen lots of advocates both when you were instructing them as a solicitor and then, of course, in your years as a judge, what would your tips be? 

(Justice Kyrou) I've got two tips to add. One is answer questions from the Bench directly and honestly, rather than reframing the question and evading. And the other is if the Bench states to you, we understand that point. That's a big, big hint for move on to your next point. Don't continue labouring that particular point.

Working for the Court of Appeal

(Nick) Hi, my name's Nick. I work in the Court of Appeal Registry and I'm the Deputy Registrar, Legal.

What roles are there in the Court of Appeal?

Besides the judge, there's a variety of roles in the Court of Appeal. Each judge has one or two associates in their chambers. There's researchers, there are secretarial support, and there are tipstaves. Those roles directly support the judges, both out of court, such as preparing for hearings and judgments, and also in court. They coordinate the lawyers and parties coming into the courtroom and control the court technology like video links to prisons and livestreams. In the background, there's a registry. The registry is managed by judicial registrars. They're assisted by deputy registrars. And there are teams of lawyers and administrative staff. The registry assesses documents that are submitted for filing and generally maintains the court's files.

The particular role of the lawyers is to case manage each matter from start to finish. And of course the registry is responsible for coordinating the listings of hearings. 

Meet our associates

(Samantha) My name's Samantha and I'm an associate at the Court of Appeal to Justice Priest. 

(Elif) My name is Elif. I'm an associate at the Court of Appeal to Justices Priest, Beach and McLeish.

(Josh) I'm Josh, I’m Elif’s co-associate with Justice McLeish. 

How did you come to work in the Court of Appeal?

After law school, I practiced as a solicitor at a commercial law firm working in disputes for a couple of years. I then worked for a short period for a research centre that focuses on constitutional law and advises countries that are either making or changing constitutions. Since then, I've been here initially as an associate to a judge in the trial division, and then for the last couple of years to Justice McLeish.

(Elif) After I graduated from law school, I did an internship overseas for four months in international law. While I was overseas, I applied for the position which I saw advertised on the Victorian Government Jobs Board. 

(Samantha) I've been at the Court of Appeal for just over two years now. When I started this role, my main focus was to learn as much as I possibly could. And during my two years, while I have learned a lot since then, I have gained so much confidence. I've become a more critical thinker. And most importantly, I've also gained these relationships with members of counsel, my fellow associates and judges, and all of which will be really important in the next phase of my career.

(Elif) In this role, I really valued the opportunity to speak to the judges about the matters we hear in court. I find it very interesting to hear their views after they've read the written materials which chambers will receive prior to the hearing. And after the hearing, sometimes the judges will be confirmed or sometimes it may change. And that can be a very fascinating discussion to have.

(Josh) I think for me, the kind of attraction of being an associate was that I was really interested in courtroom advocacy and also legal research. And being an associate, you kind of have a ringside seat to some really great courtroom advocacy and the opportunity to sort of delve really deeply into difficult legal questions. 

What is the role of the associate?

(Josh) The role of the associate is to, as Nick mentioned, basically to assist the judge in court and outside of court. And so a large part of that is assisting with their actual work in the court, drafting judgments and presiding in court with the parties. 

(Elif) One of the most important parts of our role is proofreading draft judgments before the judgment is published online. It's the associate’s job to triple check all the facts, the grammar, the spelling, the footnotes to make sure everything is in order.

(Samantha) Clerking in court is an important role for an associate sitting in between the bench and the barristers. You've got the best seat in the house. To watch the back and forth between a great appellate advocate and the bench is something really special. And a part of being a clerking associate is that you need to make sure all of the materials and the updated application books are before the Bench so that the hearing can run smoothly and nothing is left out of the Bench’s consideration.

What makes working for the Court of Appeal interesting?

(Elif) In the appellate division, sometimes we can hear a matter that raises a legal question which has never been asked before. So the judge's decision can be groundbreaking and set a precedent, and that can be a very satisfying experience to be involved in. 

(Josh) Couldn't agree more. I've been fortunate to work on some groundbreaking matters with Sammy and Elif in my time here. And actually that reminds me that another really important aspect of working at the Court of Appeal is just how collegiate it is. 

So I had the experience of working in the trial division before this, which is also great, but you're quite confined to your judge's chambers. It's one judge working on their own. But in the Court of Appeal, you're sitting with some combination of the dozen or so other judges all the time. So a big part of my job is working with other associate Sammy, Elif, and other of our colleagues, and we feed off the good ideas of each other. So for me, that's a wonderful part of the experience. 

One of the other interesting things about working at the Court of Appeal is the volume and the variety of the cases that we hear. On some weeks, we could be hearing a number of appeals across a number of different areas of law. 

There could be an appeal from a criminal sentence, it could be a large scale commercial dispute, could be a wills and estates matter, it could be a constitutional matter. And that variety keeps the work incredibly stimulating. 

(Samantha) Being an associate also gave me time to think about the next stage of my career, whether I pursue the natural progression of going to the Bar or I take an alternative route. The associateship has really helped clarify what that next move will be. 

Meet our registry staff

(James) My name is James and I'm a lawyer at the Court of Appeal. 

(Sherin) My name is Sherin and I'm a registry officer at the Court of Appeal. 

(James) So my role in the Court of Appeal Registry is as a lawyer to assist in the active case management of proceedings. That's from the, from the initial filing all the way through to hearing, involves a lot of active case management, making sure parties file the right things, get the right documents in, but also assisting other registry staff and assisting judges with preparation and working closely with the registrar and deputy registrar as well.

(Sherin) So my role as a registry officer is essentially communicating with a wide range of court uses, so that can include self-represented litigants. We also mainly assist registry lawyers like James with case management as well, just checking, making sure new cases are filed correctly, the details are good. We also assist with listing matters, checking orders, authenticating orders. So mostly the administrative work, we deal with.

(James) I've worked as a lawyer for several years before coming to the court. I was pleasantly surprised at how much actual legal work is involved in this job. A lot of research, a lot of, really, the need to really understand each proceeding and the legal issues and the parties’ arguments. So my, my background as a lawyer has been very helpful. This role is a very interesting one and a very good progression from having worked in private practice. 

(Sherin) So I did an Advanced Diploma of Legal Practice and I was also working in Funds in Court, which is a part of the Supreme Court, while I was studying. So I think the course, as well as the work experience, was really valuable to get into the Court of Appeal Registry.

The team at the Court of Appeal, they're all open to, you know, supporting you and teaching you new things. If there are things that we officers don't understand that may not necessarily be important to do our tasks, they still take time to explain things, you know. And so in that way, we learn a little bit more about the law, the way it's applied. So I think there's always opportunities to grow and learn in the Court of Appeal Registry. 

(James) I find the legal work in the Court of Appeal extremely interesting. And being the Court of Appeal, we get some of the most interesting disputes you can get. I work in the civil side of things, but we see appeals from all manner of areas of law which is one of the one of the challenges. 

And one of the interesting things is, is being able to research and come up to school, get up to speed on, on areas you might not necessarily be familiar with at first. So you learn a lot. And it's more complex and interesting for that reason.

AustLll: You can access Court of Appeal decisions from July 1998 onwards on the Australasian Legal Information lnstitute (AustLll) database.

Law Library Victoria: If you are looking to expand your knowledge, sign up to the Law Library Victoria's bulletin which provides a current summary of Victorian and High Court of Australia cases, Victorian legislation, and select articles, from the preceding fortnight. Find out more on the Law Libracy Victoria's website.