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Brittany Higgins becomes the defendant · The Front

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Speaker 1: the news from the Australian. From the Australian Keyes, what's
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Speaker 1: on the Front. I'm Claire Harvey. It's Monday, August five.
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Speaker 1: There's a giant shakeup coming for aviation as the federal
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Speaker 1: government vows to crack down on anti competitive behavior and
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Speaker 1: make it easier for new airlines to use Australia's biggest airport, Sydney.
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Speaker 1: One of the nation's most senior Indigenous leaders is accusing
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Speaker 1: Anthony Albanesi of breaking an election promise after the PM
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Speaker 1: said he won't establish a Macarata Commission for Treaty and
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Speaker 1: Truth Telling ULARU Dialogue co chair Pat Anderson says Albanese's
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Speaker 1: position is confusing and a breach of his vow to
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Speaker 1: enact the Uluru Statement in full. Former Morrison government minister
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Speaker 1: Linda Reynolds will enter the witness box in Perth this
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Speaker 1: week in her defamation case against former employee Brittany Higgins
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Speaker 1: and her husband David Chiraz. Reynolds says Higgins and Schiraz
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Speaker 1: deliberately plotted to make her the villain in higgins account
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Speaker 1: of being raped in Parliament House today. Who can possibly
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Speaker 1: win such a personal and expensive legal battle. On July four,
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Speaker 1: twenty twenty three, Brittaney Higgins fired up her Instagram and
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Speaker 1: published this story.
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Speaker 2: This is from a current Australian senator who continues to
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Speaker 2: harass me through.
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Speaker 1: The media and in the Parliament.
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Speaker 2: My former boss, who publicly apologized for mishandling my rape allegation,
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Speaker 2: who has had to apologize publicly after defending me in
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Speaker 2: the workplace, who had a whole bunch of questionable conduct
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Speaker 2: during my rape trial, who was suing my fiance for
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Speaker 2: a tweet. This has been going on for years now.
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Speaker 2: It is time to stop.
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Speaker 1: We're using a voice actor to bring you Higgins's words,
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Speaker 1: the meaning of which are totally denied by that boss,
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Speaker 1: Senator Linda Reynolds. Included in that Instagram story were two
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Speaker 1: headlines from that day's news reporting that Senator Reynolds, Higgins's
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Speaker 1: former ministerial boss, was objecting to a two point four
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Speaker 1: million dollar compensation payout Higgins had received from the Commonwealth.
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Speaker 1: On twenty July twenty twenty three, Higgins quoted a story
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Speaker 1: from The Australian that said Senator Reynolds was suggesting an
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Speaker 1: amendment to the Act's Crimes Act to deter individuals from
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Speaker 1: using the media or Parliament to refer to an alleged
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Speaker 1: criminal offense that ought properly to be the subject of
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Speaker 1: the criminal justice process. She's what Higgins said on Twitter.
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Speaker 2: Imagine being the person earnestly attempting to change the Crime
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Speaker 2: Act to make it illegal for alleged sexual assault survivors
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Speaker 2: to talk about their lived experience, as opposed to, you know,
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Speaker 2: reforming the justice system to actually prosecuting perpetrators. This proposal
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Speaker 2: completely undermines all the crucial work done by the Let
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Speaker 2: Her Speak campaign and the March for Justice movement. Instead
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Speaker 2: of solving the problem, there are people who would prefer
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Speaker 2: to just silence victims.
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Speaker 1: Now, Reynolds is suing Higgins and her husband David Cheraz
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Speaker 1: for defamation. On Monday, Reynolds will enter the witness box
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Speaker 1: that the truth is about to be told. It voluntarily
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Speaker 1: time for the truth.
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Speaker 3: She sees this very much as her chance to set
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Speaker 3: the record straight in her eyes.
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Speaker 1: Paul Garvey is a senior journalist with The Australian who
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Speaker 1: was in court on Friday when Reynold's lawyer opened the case.
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Speaker 3: She feels like she's been marginalized silence through this process
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Speaker 3: that hasn't had her side told properly and certainly listening
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Speaker 3: to the opening remarks of her lawyer, Mutton Bennett, it
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Speaker 3: was clear that this was almost as much about finally
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Speaker 3: giving her her say as it was about pursuing the
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Speaker 3: defamation matter in itself.
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Speaker 1: Reynolds is also alleging that David Scharraz, now Higgins's husband,
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Speaker 1: defied her on twenty seven January twenty twenty two by tweeting.
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Speaker 4: This, there is a very real chance Linda Reynolds will
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Speaker 4: be called to court this year to answer questions on
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Speaker 4: her involvement in Brittany Higgins. Feeling pressured by her office
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Speaker 4: not to continue with a complaint to police, she uploads
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Speaker 4: this to her official website.
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Speaker 1: Charraz included a screenshot of Reynolds's website, which described the
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Speaker 1: senator as a passionate champion for gender equality and female empowerment.
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Speaker 1: Reynolds says that tweet defined her by implying she was
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Speaker 1: a hypocrite.
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Speaker 3: The content of those posts barely cracked dimension through the opening.
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Speaker 3: The opening was devoted to a large chunk that was
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Speaker 3: devoted to discussing the Commonwealth settlement that was paid to
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Speaker 3: Britney Higgins. Now, Linda Reynolds was frozen out of that
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Speaker 3: process and that's been a big bone of contention for
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Speaker 3: her throughout this whole saga.
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Speaker 1: So a quick recap. Britney Higgins has previously said in
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Speaker 1: an interview with The Project, in a criminal trial and
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Speaker 1: in a civil trial, that she felt ignored, ostracized, and
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Speaker 1: discouraged from going to police after telling her bosses she'd
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Speaker 1: been raped on a sofa in Reynolds's office. The federal
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Speaker 1: courts found, on the balance of probabilities, Higgins was raped
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Speaker 1: on that sofa by fellow staffer Bruce Lammon. He's appealing
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Speaker 1: that finding. Reynolds and her former chief of staff Fiona
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Speaker 1: Brown have always denied discouraging Higgins and have insisted actually
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Speaker 1: they encouraged her to go to police.
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Speaker 3: What we heard from Martin Bennett, reynolds lawyer, was a
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Speaker 3: lot about the efforts that Reynolds and her immediate team
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Speaker 3: went to to try to support Higgins, to try to
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Speaker 3: make sure that she had options open to her, but
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Speaker 3: that she remained the master of her own destiny. Around
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Speaker 3: whether or not she went to police, So not exploring
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Speaker 3: whether or not Higgins was actually raped, but whether or
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Speaker 3: not Linda Reynolds deliberately and callously neglected and made Higgins
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Speaker 3: suffer through this process.
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Speaker 1: Linda Reynolds case seems to allege a really quite significant
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Speaker 1: level of premeditation and planning by Brittany Higgins and David
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Speaker 1: Shiraz in the way that they were going to portray
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Speaker 1: Linda Reynolds in the Project interview and obviously subsequently in
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Speaker 1: these social media posts. That's an interesting take on this case.
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Speaker 1: It's a new one we haven't necessarily heard before, isn't it, Paul?
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Speaker 4: It is.
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Speaker 3: I mean, typically when we're talking about defamation cases, we're
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Speaker 3: looking at the publication and the impact that it has
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Speaker 3: had on an individual's reputation. Here, we're going much more
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Speaker 3: granular and forensic in a way to look at the
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Speaker 3: base motivations and the deliberate tactics that Reynolds and Bennett's
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Speaker 3: say were employed by Higgins and Scharraz.
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Speaker 1: Here, Reynolds has plenty of material to work with the
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Speaker 1: epic defamation trial where Bruce lemm ensued Network ten and
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Speaker 1: presenter Lisa Wilkinson yielded all tens notes, emails, and recordings,
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Speaker 1: including a five hour conversation between Higgins, Charaz, Wilkinson, and
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Speaker 1: producer Angus Llewellyn in which Sharaz cracked jokes about Reynolds
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Speaker 1: and Higgins said things like this again, we've used a
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Speaker 1: voice actor. And Higgins is talking about her belief she'd
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Speaker 1: be more likely to win a civil trial where her
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Speaker 1: allegation against Bruce Lherman were tested.
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Speaker 2: I would love to have a court case on like
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Speaker 2: civil if he wants to go after me on a
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Speaker 2: civil basis, I think on the balance of probabilities, I
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Speaker 2: think I could win. I think if the owners of
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Speaker 2: proof is beyond reasonable doubt, I think that would be different.
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Speaker 2: I don't think i'd win that.
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Speaker 3: That's really at the crux of this argument from Reynolds,
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Speaker 3: that there was a deliberate plan to drag her into this.
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Speaker 3: That transcript you see the parties discussing in that the
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Speaker 3: exact timing of things, trying to line it up with
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Speaker 3: a sitting week, discussing which friendly journalists to drop it to,
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Speaker 3: which friendly laybor MP's to brief on the saga, to
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Speaker 3: ensure that this went as far and as wide as possible,
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Speaker 3: and what Bennett and Reynolds would say is this effort
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Speaker 3: to make sure it wasn't just about a young woman
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Speaker 3: allegedly getting raped it in her workplace, that it was
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Speaker 3: about a political cover up of that incident too, which
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Speaker 3: I think Bennett and Reynolds are both arguing that Higgins
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Speaker 3: and Chiraz knew that it needed to have that broader
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Speaker 3: aspect to it, that extra dimension to make it a bigger, spicier,
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Speaker 3: more dramatic story.
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Speaker 1: Linda Reynolds had to deal upfront with her own attack
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Speaker 1: on Brittany Higgins, a moment when she called Higgins a
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Speaker 1: lying cow and then had to apologize and settle a
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Speaker 1: defamation action brought by Higgins.
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Speaker 3: For those who missed it early on in the saga,
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Speaker 3: I think it was us that the Australian who broke
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Speaker 3: this story about Nnda Reynolds using that phrase lying cow
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Speaker 3: to describe Higgins when she was watching the project interview.
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Speaker 3: So Bennett, basically his argument is that it wasn't suggesting
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Speaker 3: that Higgins was lying about whether or not she was raped,
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Speaker 3: it was lying about Reynolds's efforts to support or protect
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Speaker 3: her in the aftermath.
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Speaker 1: So Reynolds is saying she did call Higgins a lying cow,
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Speaker 1: but only because she object so passionately to the claim
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Speaker 1: Reynolds had ignored or tried to minimize her rape.
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Speaker 3: So Bennett explained it that the comments lying was, he said,
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Speaker 3: utterly appropriate given what Higgins was saying Reynolds had done
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Speaker 3: in her handling of that saga. He said the cow
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Speaker 3: line was unfortunate, but was basically a byproduct of the
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Speaker 3: anger that Reynolds had at that time hearing the allegations
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Speaker 3: were made about her, and then the portrayal of her
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Speaker 3: as someone who was quite sort of brutal towards this
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Speaker 3: vulnerable young woman. So it's all part of what seems
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Speaker 3: to be an element of this case, which is giving
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Speaker 3: Linda Reynolds a voice after all these years.
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Speaker 1: Coming up after years of pre troll wrangling and a
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Speaker 1: hugely expensive court hearing. Who can possibly walk away from
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Speaker 1: this a winner? Something that won't bankrupt anyone is a
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Speaker 1: subscription to The Australian. It's a dollar a week for
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Speaker 1: the first four weeks to get the nation's best journalism
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Speaker 1: twenty four to seven. Check us out at the Australian
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Speaker 1: dot com dot a U. This week, Linda Reynolds will
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Speaker 1: give evidence and next week she'll call witnesses, including former
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Speaker 1: PM Scott Morrison. I don't know if it's just that
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Speaker 1: I spent a lot of time covering the Bruce Lamon
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Speaker 1: defamation trial, and I know that that costs millions and
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Speaker 1: millions of dollars for both sides. But I can only
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Speaker 1: think this must be costing Linda Reynolds a.
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Speaker 3: Fortune, absolutely, and it's something that has left a lot
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Speaker 3: of people quite baffle confused around this whole saga, and
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Speaker 3: that both Reynolds and Higgins don't have a whole bunch
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Speaker 3: of assets to throw at this right the Lerman t
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Speaker 3: while Network ten it's a corporate behemoth. Linda Reynolds is
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Speaker 3: funding this out of her own pocket. Her lawyer has
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Speaker 3: already said that she has had to re mortgage her
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Speaker 3: house to fund this. Now. I don't think Linda Reynolds
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Speaker 3: would mind me saying this, but she's not a young woman, right,
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Speaker 3: She's at the very end of her career. She's retiring
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Speaker 3: at the next election. She is not a prime example
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Speaker 3: of someone who should be driving themselves into hock to
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Speaker 3: fund a legal action. But it shows that for her,
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Speaker 3: she sees this very much as her legacy, her reputation
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Speaker 3: on the line here, but the cost of that is
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Speaker 3: significant financially. If she wins, she can get some money
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Speaker 3: from Miss Higgins in theory, but that will then involve
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Speaker 3: delving into the trust that Miss Higgins has set up,
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Speaker 3: whether that's achievable or not, whether there'll be anything left
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Speaker 3: by the time it comes to that as well. And
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Speaker 3: then from miss Higgins's side, she was, as far as
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Speaker 3: the federal court determined, at least she was actually raped
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Speaker 3: that day, and she would be left in the position
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Speaker 3: where she suddenly has to write a check to the
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Speaker 3: boss of the office in which she was raped, which,
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Speaker 3: if you put yourself in her shoes, that's quite an
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Speaker 3: uncomfortable thing to say the least, so as really lose
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Speaker 3: lose for all concerned. It seems apparent from the outside
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Speaker 3: that that's always going to be the end result here.
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Speaker 3: The pleadings of judges who have handled this case to
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Speaker 3: date to both parties saying, look, please find a way
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Speaker 3: to set all this. Don't take this trial. It won't
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Speaker 3: work out for you. We can all see the end result.
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Speaker 3: It doesn't look pretty for other party. Yet here we are,
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Speaker 3: and it's going all the way.
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Speaker 1: Of course, now Britney Higgins and David Schaaz are the
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Speaker 1: defendants in this matter, which means they have to come
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Speaker 1: up with some defenses to the alleged defamation. We see
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Speaker 1: publishers use the defense of truth and also attempts to
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Speaker 1: show that their journalism was reasonable. I can only imagine
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Speaker 1: in this case, and reading your report of Martin Bennett's opening,
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Speaker 1: that Britney higgins defense is going to be truth, that
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Speaker 1: this was true. What do you think her defense is
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Speaker 1: going to be?
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Speaker 3: Yeah, from what we've seen so far, it's very much
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Speaker 3: about her trying to establish that Reynolds did isolate her,
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Speaker 3: that there was this, as she calls it, harassment of
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Speaker 3: her through that process. We will hear from miss Higgins
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Speaker 3: later in the trial. I think she started down to
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Speaker 3: give about three days of evidence. I think Martin Bennett,
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Speaker 3: for Reynolds, has already shown a little bit as to
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Speaker 3: how he's going to approach that. A lot of what
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Speaker 3: Higgins has said over the journey has been about I
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Speaker 3: felt that I was neglected, I felt that I wasn't supported.
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Speaker 3: He gave a line during the proceedings a couple of
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Speaker 3: times on Friday, saying that feelings are not facts that
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Speaker 3: just because you feel something doesn't make it true. He
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Speaker 3: will be very much focused on where's the documentary evidence,
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Speaker 3: how do you show this? And that's why I think
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Speaker 3: there was a lot of time spent on Friday going
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Speaker 3: over the text messages and the photographs of Brittney Higgins
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Speaker 3: during her time in Perth. So, just to go back
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Speaker 3: a step, when Higgins negotiated that settlement with the Commonwealth,
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Speaker 3: that two point four four five million dollars that she received,
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Speaker 3: part of her claim was that she was sent to
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Speaker 3: Perth where she worked alone in a hotel room seven
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Speaker 3: days a week for six weeks, and that that caused
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Speaker 3: her a deterioration in her mental health. So Bennett on
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Speaker 3: Friday spent hours going through text messages that she was
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Speaker 3: sending to her then boyfriend.
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Speaker 2: It's actually a really nice place and surprisingly spacious, hahuh.
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Speaker 2: Just helping them out with all the campaign launches coming up,
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Speaker 2: fundraising events.
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Speaker 1: It's been pretty fun actually.
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Speaker 3: She talked about how much fun she was having working
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Speaker 3: on the campaign, how she was out and about door knocking,
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Speaker 3: how she was at campaign events and launches and dinners
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Speaker 3: and breakfasts.
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Speaker 2: My day has been awesome spent pool side. It's been
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Speaker 2: really nice liking the WA office. I can't wait for
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Speaker 2: the ANZAC Day festivities.
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Speaker 3: And then this procession of photos showing her doing that
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Speaker 3: door knocking standing with the Prime Minister being a smiley,
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Speaker 3: knotty head in the background of press events and the like.
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Speaker 2: I will be in the back of the PM's announcement today.
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Speaker 2: This is my fifteen minutes of fame.
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Speaker 3: So really sort of signaling that if miss Higgins wants
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Speaker 3: to make that claim that she will need to actually
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Speaker 3: back that up with hard evidence. That seems to be
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Speaker 3: Bennett's aproach at this point in time, and something that
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Speaker 3: he will no doubt thoroughly explore when Higgins does on
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Speaker 3: the stand later this month.
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Speaker 1: Paul Gravey is a senior journalist with The Australian. We'll
16:55
Speaker 1: have live coverage of that trial exclusively for our subscribers
16:59
Speaker 1: at the Australian dot com dot a You