Higgins’ defense amid ‘fairy tale’ rape cover-up claim

Brittany Higgins’ defense of social media posts that allegedly cast Liberal Senator Linda Reynolds as a villain in a ‘fictional story of political cover-up’ is set to begin at a high-profile defamation trial.

Ms Higgins is being sued over a series of social media posts in 2022 and 2023 that the former defense minister says damaged her reputation as she pursues vindication for alleged mistruths.

Ms Higgins is using the defense of truth to fight Senator Reynolds’ defamation claim, with her lawyer Rachael Young SC scheduled to deliver her opening submissions on Monday

Senator Reynolds’ lawyer, Martin Bennett, robustly defended his client’s actions following Ms Higgins’ alleged rape by then-colleague Bruce Lehrmann at Parliament House in 2019 on the first day of the trial on Friday.

He said accusations of ill-treatment, ostracism, bullying, harassment and threatening conduct by the senator were a fiction concocted by Ms Higgins and her now husband David Sharaz.

“Every fairy tale needs a villain” and Ms Higgins and Mr Sharaz “cast Senator Reynolds in that role for their fictional story of political cover-up of the rape,” he told the Western Australian Supreme Court during its opening.

“She was cast in … critical light and none of it was true.”

He noted Senator Reynolds had never disputed Ms Higgins’ rape allegation and pointed to Ms Higgins’ personal injury claim, over alleged mishandling of the incident, which the Commonwealth settled for $2.4 million in late 2022.

“The claims made by Ms Higgins were false and Senator Reynolds was denied the appropriate venue, the appropriate time, the appropriate funding by the Commonwealth to defend the actions of herself and her staff,” he said.

Ms Higgins and Mr Sharaz created a detailed plan in 2020 and 2021, which she recorded on her phone as “the cult of politics, the media lens of a political sex scandal, anatomy of a political sex scandal”, Mr Bennett said.

“The fact she had been raped was traumatic and terrible but it needed something more to attract… media interest… so she made it a political sex scandal,” he said.

The couple courted journalists Lisa Wilkinson on Network Ten’s The Project and Samantha Maiden from News Corp amid a “sophisticated” campaign to inflict maximum damage on Senator Reynolds, Mr Bennett said.

The trial is set down for about five weeks and high-profile witnesses including former prime minister Scott Morrison, former defense minister Marise Payne, and WA Liberal Senator Michaelia Cash are expected to appear.

Senator Reynolds is scheduled to take the witness stand on Monday after Ms Higgins’ lawyer completes her submissions.

Ms Higgins is expected to give evidence in the last week of August.

Bruce Lehrmann has always denied sexually assaulting Ms Higgins. His criminal trial was aborted because of jury misconduct and Ms Higgins’ mental health was cited as the reason for no retrial.

In a separate defamation case a judge in 2024 found Mr Lehrmann did rape Ms Higgins but there was little evidence of a cover-up.