Former Liberal staffer Bruce Lehrmann was portrayed as a “prominent rapist” and one of the “most revolting predators of the recent history of this country” in an episode of Network Ten’s The Project, a Sydney court has heard.

On the opening day of Mr Lehrmann’s defamation trial against Ten and its former star host Lisa Wilkinson, his barrister Matthew Richardson SC, played the entire 26-minute episode, and described it as being strategically edited to heighten the emotions and attack the alleged perpetrator.