Querulous behaviour: vexatious litigation, abnormally persistent complaining and petitioning
Paul E. Mullen
Querulantenwahn (Ger.) A form of so called paranoia in which there exists in a patient an insuppressible and fanatic craving for going to law in order to get redress for some wrong which he believes done to him. Individuals who fall victim to this disorder are always strongly predisposed …. extremely egotistical … know everything better … differs from other forms of paranoia in so far as the wrong may not be quite imaginary … the more he fails the more he becomes convinced that enormous wrong is being done to him … neglects his family and his business … going down the road to ruin.(1)
The above quote neatly summarizes classical psychiatry’s view of querulous, or litigious, insanity as a form of paranoia. A problematic form, however, in that the querulousness was usually based on a genuine grievance and was often regarded as developing on the basis of predispositions rooted in the sufferer’s personality.(2,3,4) As to treatment Krafft Ebing(3) notes the ‘necessary and beneficent (effects of the) appointment of a guardian and commitment to an asylum’ but regretted that this ‘takes place unfortunately only after they have used up their property, insulted the courts, and disturbed public order’ (p. 395).
Psychiatries interest in the querulous (from the Latin to mutter and to mumble) waned rapidly in the latter half of the twentieth century. The diagnosis was appealed to less and less and the literature largely fell silent.(5) In part the disappearance of querulousness, and even the querulous patient, from the realms of psychiatry paralleled the decline of paranoia as a diagnostic entity. In part it reflected psychiatries increasing reluctance to play the role of social regulator. Probably most importantly the emerging culture of individual rights made pathologizing complainants potentially disastrous as it could deprive them of access to the major social mechanisms for obtaining justice.(6) Psychiatry lost interest in the querulant, however, at the very time that the ‘culture of complaint’ drew more and more vulnerable people into the systems of complaint management. Agencies of accountability, which range from Ombudsmen’s offices, via registration boards, to complaints departments, are now almost all faced with the problems created by a small group of people pursuing grievances with a persistence and insistence out of all proportion to the substantive nature of their claim. It is estimated that 20-30 per cent of the resources of these agencies are being consumed by less than 1 per cent of unusually persistent complainants. In the civil and family courts the number of interminable cases being pursued, often by unrepresented litigants, escalates year by year. Last, but not the least, querulants pursuing what they regard as their rights through repeated petitions and intrusive approaches to politicians and heads of state distract protection services from more substantial threats.(7,8,9)
Clinical features
The querulant pursue their vision of justice through litigation in the court, through petitions to the powerful, and finally through the various agencies of accountability. In practice all three avenues are often explored. In the nineteenth and early twentieth century it was the civil courts in which these dramas were usually played out. Today the main burden falls on the complaints organizations.
It is not easy to distinguish the querulant from the difficult complainant or even from social reformers and victims of gross injustice. A simple typology may assist:
1 Normal complainants are aggrieved seeking compensation, reparation, or just an apology. They will accept conciliation and reasonable solutions, though they may become persistent and insistent if provoked by inefficiency or injustice.
2 Difficult complainants also seek compensation and reparation but often want in addition retribution. They tend from the outset to anger, to seeing themselves as the victim of others intentional malevolence, and to resist all solutions but their own. Eventually, however, they will settle for the best deal they can obtain.
3 Altruistic reformers who pursue goals of social progress via the courts, petitions, and complaints. They sacrifice their personal interests in pursuit of better outcomes for others. Though they may have a political agenda which is sectarian (e.g. antigenetically
modified foods, fathers rights) they do not have idiosyncratic and personalized objectives.
modified foods, fathers rights) they do not have idiosyncratic and personalized objectives.
4 Fraudsters who knowingly pursue false or grossly exaggerated claims.
5 The mentally ill whose claims are driven by delusional preoccupations frequently bizarre in nature which reflect underlying disorders often of a schizophrenic type.
6 The querulous who seek personal vindication in addition to compensation, reparation, and retribution. They are on a quest for justice which becomes totally preoccupying. Unlike reformers, and most of the difficult, there is an obvious discrepancy between the provoking event and the importance attached to it by the querulous. They appear to seek not resolution but continuation of the conflict. They lay waste to their social and economic functioning.
The querulous are usually males who first become embroiled in complaining and claiming in their fourth or fifth decade. Premorbidly they were often able to function reasonably well. They rarely have criminal records or prior psychiatric contact, and substance abuse is not prominent. Many had relationships but by the time they reach psychiatrists they have usually alienated their family and friends. Querulants are often disappointed people who feel their qualities have been ignored and left unrewarded. Their pursuit of justice offers an opportunity to vindicate their lives and obtain the public recognition so long denied. Their personalities tend to have the traits of self-absorption, suspiciousness, and obsessionality combined with an enviable capacity for persistence.
Clinically they typically present as energized, garrulous individuals eager to convince you of the merits of their case. There is an enthusiasm which can seem almost manic but unlike the manic they are totally focussed and almost impossible to distract from their narrative of injustice. They may come with bags overflowing with documents testifying to their misplaced scholarship. If challenged they usually become patronizing as they pedantically refute all objections, to their complete satisfaction. Alternatively they may become menacing and overtly threatening.
Communications from querulants were noted by Lester and colleagues(10) to be often characterized by:
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