Susie O’Brien: Chickens coming home to roost for Brittany Higgins in Linda Reynolds case

Having spent years creating legal turmoil for many others, it was inevitable that Brittany Higgins’ actions caught up with her — even from the other side of the world.

No doubt Brittany Higgins is hearing the coqs crowing from the charming rural French home where she and husband Dave Sharaz have been living since late last year.

The roosters are coming home to roost for the rape survivor. She has said she will have to sell the five-bedroom Dordogne maison to fund her defence in defamation proceedings brought by former Defence Minister Linda Reynolds.

I can’t say I am all that sorry to hear it.

Having spent years creating legal turmoil for many others, it was inevitable that Higgins’ actions caught up with her – even from the other side of the world.

Like many other women, I was in Camp Brittany when she first went public with her claims of being raped by Bruce Lehrmann in Parliament House.

The house France where Brittany Higgins started her new life. Picture: Instagram

I believed her about what happened that night and still do.

However, in the process of bringing down Lehrmann, Higgins and Sharaz did a number on Reynolds, accusing her of trying to cover up her rape claims.

They tried to exploit the personal claim against Lehrmann for political gain.

That’s where they lost me.

It doesn’t help that the French abode was purchased with funds from an unprecedented $2.4m handout from Australian taxpayers. Higgins, who should have had the good grace to pocket the funds and lie low, has been documenting her new lifestyle on social media, including her engagement, wedding and trips to the Maldives, Paris, London, Byron Bay and the Gold Coast.

Higgins and husband David Sharaz at the Bordeaux-Merignac airport in France. Picture: Jacquelin Magnay

Cash-strapped taxpayers didn’t like the couple’s airport appearance last December, where they triumphantly departed for rural France decked out in matching cream-coloured outfits. Who did they think they were? Love Island contestants?

All of this is why it’s outrageous for Higgins’s spokeswoman to assert that the “price of speaking out about sexual assault remains unspeakably high”.

“Brittany is now forced to sell her home in order to defend herself again.”

Higgins is not paying the price for being a sexual assault victim – for which she was handsomely compensated by federal taxpayers.

She is paying the price for her political vendetta. Saying “au revoir” to her French hideaway is just the beginning.

When she left Australia, Higgins said she relocated to France to escape online bullying and trolls, but she can’t escape her own social media attacks on Reynolds.