Ian Freckelton

Freckelton has been elected a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Law, and the Academy of Social Sciences Australia as well as an Honorary Fellow of the Australasian College of Legal Medicine. He has also been elected a life member of the Australian and New Zealand Association of Psychiatry, Psychology and Law. He was elected a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences, 2022.

Freckelton was appointed an Officer of the Order of Australia for "distinguished service to the law, and to the legal profession, across fields including health, medicine and technology" in the 2021 Queen's Birthday Honours.

In 2019 and 2020 Freckelton was incorporated by Doyle's Guide amongst Victoria's Leading Senior Criminal Law Counsel, in 2021 amongst Australia's Leading Administrative and Public Law Barristers and in 2021 by Best Lawyers for Administrative Law.

Freckelton was appointed a judge of the Supreme Court of Nauru on a fly-in, fly-out basis in 2017, principally to hear appeals on questions of law from asylum-seekers.

Freckelton was a Commissioner of the Victorian Law Reform Commission in 2015-2016 and ran its reference on Medicinal Cannabis which resulted in the Access to Medicinal Cannabis Act 2016 (Vic).

Since 2010 Freckelton has been an inaugural member of the Coronial Council of Victoria, a body that advises the Attorney-General about the operation of the Coroner's Court. Since 1995, he has been a member of the Mental Health Tribunal of Victoria, including for a time as its Acting President. He is also a member of the Netherlands Centre of Expertise.

In 1993 he was presented with a red barrister's bag by Frank Costigan QC for his work on the Children of God case. In 2019 Freckelton was the winner of a Distinguished Alumnus award by Griffith University. In the same year, Freckelton was a member of the legal team that won the Tim McCoy Award and also the Victorian Bar's pro bono award for public interest/justice innovation for his work on the Barwon Children's Case.

In 1993 and 1994 Freckelton founded the Journal of Law and Medicine and Psychiatry, Psychology and Law, having previously edited the proceedings of conferences held by the Australian and New Zealand Association of Psychiatry, Psychology and Law for some years. He remains their editor and founding editor respectively and has written many editorials for each. Each has evolved into a highly ranked and internationally respected scholarly journal in the cross-disciplinary field of health and law. Freckelton was also a member of the team (with Bebe Loff and Beth Wilson) that transitioned the Legal Service Bulletin to the Alternative Law Journal in 1992, and was on the editorial board of both for many years.

He commenced to take briefs at the Victorian Bar in 1988 and took silk as a Senior Counsel/Queen's Counsel in 2007. Freckelton has a national practice from Castan Chambers in Melbourne, Australia, taking administrative law, criminal law, personal injury and professional liability, coronial, commercial, disciplinary and human rights cases, as well as undertaking investigations into allegations of misconduct and corruption.

Freckelton was born in Durban, South Africa, to Joan Lloyd and Brian Freckelton. He then lived with his family in Nairobi, Kenya, and Sydney, Australia, where he attended St Aloysius’ College and then the University of Sydney, obtaining undergraduate degrees in Arts (with Honours in English and Latin) and Law. Later he was awarded a Diploma of Therapeutic Massage from the Academy of Natural Healing (1982); a PhD in Expert Evidence by Griffith University, (1998); and a Doctor of Laws degree, (a higher doctorate), from the University of Melbourne (2017).

Freckelton worked between 1981 and 1986 at the Australian Law Reform Commission on its references on Evidence, Aboriginal Customary Law, and Contempt. Between 1986 and 1988, Freckelton worked as Counsel Assisting the Police Complaints Authority of Victoria before reading for the Bar to commence work as a barrister.