Humana Design worked with NSW Department of Justice from 2015 to 2017 to understand the court experience of vulnerable witnesses, particularly children, and develop a person-centred perspective and service-level prototype for a more humane justice journey.
The context The NSW Department of Justice is responsible for the administration of justice across New South Wales, including courts, victim and witness services, and the systems that support people through some of the most difficult moments of their lives. By 2015, the Department recognised that the traditional court experience could be deeply traumatic for vulnerable witnesses — particularly children who had suffered child sexual abuse and were required to give evidence against a perpetrator. What started as a brief for a new website became a much larger question: what does the experience of giving evidence actually feel like for a vulnerable person, and how might the entire service be designed around their wellbeing, dignity and need for safety? What we did Humana Design worked with NSW Department of Justice from May 2015 to May 2017 to research the full service ecosystem and reframe the challenge from a digital delivery problem to a whole service transformation opportunity. Research across the full ecosystem. We spoke with vulnerable witnesses and their families, support services, court staff, legal professionals, policy makers and operational teams to understand the lived exper
Humana Design — service design and design research consultancy, Dublin, Ireland.