Last witness to be called in Higgins trial

The last witness in senator Linda Reynolds’ defamation battle with Brittany Higgins will give their evidence on Thursday.

Former Australian Federal Police assistant commissioner Leanne Close has been called to give evidence about a meeting she had with Senator Reynolds after Ms Higgins made a complaint with police about her alleged rape.

Senator Reynolds is suing Ms Higgins and her husband David Sharaz over a number of social media posts the pair made in 2022 and 2023.

The posts were critical of Senator Reynolds’ handling of Ms Higgins’ allegation she was raped in Parliament House in 2019 by her then-colleague Mr Lehrmann.

He was charged with rape and faced trial in 2022, but the trial was aborted due to juror misconduct.

The charge was dropped and Mr Lehrmann continues to maintain his innocence.

Mr Lehrmann lost a subsequent civil defamation case in April this year when the Federal Court determined, on the balance of probabilities, that Mr Lehrmann had raped Ms Higgins at Parliament House.

On Wednesday, the court heard from award winning news.com.au political editor Samantha Maiden who broke the story about Ms Higgins’ allegations on February 15, 2021.

Ms Maiden interviewed Ms Higgins weeks before the story was published at her home in Canberra over dinner with dumplings.

Audio of that interview was played to the court, in which Ms Maiden tells Ms Higgins: “You don’t owe anyone anything. If you want to do it that’s great, you don’t have to please me or Lisa Wilkinson or anyone, just please yourself.”

During the interview, Ms Higgins said she felt like she became a sudden problem for the senator after the alleged rape took place in her office.

The senator had been in her role as defence minister for only a few weeks when she found out about a security breach in her office.

“She avoided being in photos, avoided being near me like I was toxic,” Ms Higgins said in the interview.

“She hated me.

“She worked her entire life to finally get MinDef, and I was in her office for two weeks.

“Some little twit she doesn’t know just gets assaulted in her office, and she hates it, and she hated me,” she says.

“She still, to this day, hates having to be around me.”

After the story broke Ms Maiden received a text message from Mr Sharaz saying “Scoop. Hahah,” which she thought was “inappropriate.”

Ms Maiden told the court that Ms Higgins’ motivation for the interview was to make sure there were systemic changes in the failures she had seen in the parliamentary workplace.

The senator’s lawyer Martin Bennett questioned her about a text message she sent Ms Higgins’ which read “just having played a part in your operation has been one of the greatest moments in journalism I’ve ever had.”

Ms Maiden responded she had meant breaking the story and the issues Ms Higgins had raised to improve the parliamentary workplace.

“I was very proud of her and the issues that she had raised,” Ms Maiden said.

“I thought they were very important, and she went on to change the law.

“I thought she was showing a great deal of bravery in what she had done, at great personal cost.”

Under cross examination, the court was told Senator Reynolds told Ms Maiden she had no idea if Ms Higgins’ rape allegation was true or false because she was “not in the room.”

The first time the pair spoke about the rape allegation was in June 2022, but it wasn’t the purpose of the conversation, Ms Maiden had wanted her side of the story for a book she was writing.

The trial continues.