Andrew Bolt: ABC’s Porter case revelations raise red flags

This week the ABC revealed the woman allegedly raped by Christian Porter went to dinner with him years later — so what else are they holding back?

What sick game is the ABC playing? Only this Monday did it casually mention that the woman allegedly raped by Christian Porter went out to dinner with him six years later.

Pardon? What woman goes to dinner with the rapist they claim destroyed their life?

Why didn’t ABC tell us about this dinner when it first started its campaign to out Porter, the Attorney-General, as a man accused of raping a girl 33 years ago, when she was 16 and he 17?

For some six months, ABC reporter Louise Milligan has been trying to crucify Porter, in part relying on documents written by the mentally-ill woman, who killed herself last year.

But it was only on Monday’s Four Corners, in which Milligan presented reheated claims from woman’s friends to keep Porter under pressure, did I first hear her mention a detail, already dribbling out in other media outlets, that should make most reasonable people doubt this rape ever occurred.

The ABC had already described how Porter allegedly raped the woman when they were visiting Sydney as student debaters in 1988. After this rape, Four Corners reported, the woman became “depressed”, suffered “enormous stress” and had her great talents “squandered”.

But on Monday, Milligan finally had an actor read out a passage from the woman’s statement accusing Porter in which she claimed she’d actually went out with him again, six years later.

“The last time that I saw CP was in 1994, in Perth,” the woman said.

“I was there for the annual Australian Historians’ Association conference ... One evening, I had dinner with CP. On this occasion, he made various inappropriate remarks to me.”

And a friend of the woman told Four Corners: “Kate talked about and wrote about her in her documents, having been in Perth in 1994, and contacting Christian and having dinner with him and spending what appeared to be several hours with him.”

Does this pass the smell test? A woman contacting her rapist, having dinner with him and spending “several hours” in his company?

Porter says he has no recollection of this dinner, and fiercely denies he raped or even had sex with the woman in their earlier alleged encounter.

There are flaws in the Christian Porter case that the ABC has ignored, overlooked or played down. Picture: Sharon Smith

This supposed dinner just does not fit. It should have made any impartial journalist think twice before accepting the woman’s rape claim as true.

But Milligan has form for steamrolling over improbabilities in a manic conviction that her cause is sacred.

She also spearheaded the crusade to convict the innocent Cardinal George Pell of raping two boys — one of whom said he wasn’t raped, and the other an accuser also with mental health battles.

Here are some of the other flaws in the Porter case that the ABC has ignored, overlooked or played down:

— Porter’s accuser apparently had an eating disorder even before the alleged rape, indicating psychological trouble.

— She was severely affected by a bipolar disorder, which can cause delusions.

— Her own parents reportedly thought her rape claim was “confected or embellished”.

— She claimed to have been raped after returning with Porter from the Hard Rock Cafe, which did not open in Sydney until 15 months later.

— If she was instead at the Oz Rock Cafe, as friends now suggest, how did she get served alcohol as a 16-year-old?

— She claims Porter then walked her back to her room at the Sydney University Women’s College. But that is a walk of perhaps 90 minutes. And what women’s college lets a boy take a girl to her room at night?

— She says Porter washed her “probably” in a bath, when most rooms at the college have communal showers, without a bath. Twin rooms there almost invariably have only showers.

— She says Porter shaved her legs before raping her. Does a 17-year-old boy really do that?

This comes from fact-checking the few specific details from the woman’s statement that the ABC and other sympathetic media outlets — who were sent it by friends — have chosen to release.

What else are they holding back that might make you doubt this rape occurred?

The ABC learned nothing from its shameful campaign to crucify Pell, and its managers seem too scared to stop Milligan from repeating the dose with Porter.

But they should at least release the documents it has from the woman, edited only to protect privacy and avoid defamation.

Let us check the strength of the ABC’s evidence. And judge whether we’re funding another witch hunt.