Senator Linda Reynolds’ call on Brittany Higgins’ rape allegation revealed in court

Senator Linda Reynolds’ response when asked if she believed Brittany Higgins’ rape allegation has been revealed in court.

Senator Linda Reynolds told a journalist she had no idea if Brittany Higgins’ rape allegation was true or false as she was “not in the room”, a court has heard.

News.com.au political editor Samantha Maiden, who interviewed Ms Higgins and broke the story about her rape allegation on February 15, 2021, was called to the stand in Senator Reynolds’ defamation trial against Ms Higgins on Wednesday.

Ms Maiden told the court when she asked Senator Reynolds if she thought Ms Higgins’ rape allegation was the truth or a lie, the senator responded: “I don’t know, I wasn’t in the room.”

Ms Maiden said the June 2022 conversation was the first time she had spoken directly to Senator Reynolds about the rape allegation.

She told the court that wasn’t the purpose of the conversation, but she was writing a book and wanted to get the senator’s side of the story.

She told the senator as soon as the trial was over that she wanted to sit down and talk with her, and also wanted to talk to her about senator Kimberley Kitching.

Ms Maiden said she was very close to Kimberley Kitching and had talked to her about these issues up until her death.

SENATOR REYNOLDS “HATES BEING AROUND ME”: HIGGINS

Earlier on Wednesday, audio from Ms Maiden’s interview with Ms Higgins, before the story broke, was played to the court, in which the senator’s former staffer spoke about her relationship with her boss and how things had played out in the wake of the alleged rape.

Early in the tape, Ms Maiden said to 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 can be heard saying that Senator Reynolds had worked her entire life to get the Minister of Defence role and in the first few weeks, Ms Higgins had been sexually assaulted in her office.

“Still to this day she hates being around me,” Ms Higgins said in the interview.

Ms Higgins told Ms Maiden that she wasn’t the interesting part of the story, but it was about where she worked and who she worked for.

“I just wanted to leave,” Ms Higgins told Ms Maiden.

“I immediately got sent to WA for six weeks, I was so depressed dealing with this, it was horrible.”

Senator Linda Reynolds was Ms Higgins’ boss at the time of the incident. Picture: NewsWire / Sharon Smith

Brittany Higgins said the Senator “hated being around her” after the alleged rape. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Monique Harmer

LEHRMANN’S CRIMINAL TRIAL

Ms Maiden told the court as soon as she found out she would not be called as a witness in Mr Lehrmann’s criminal trial, she attended the trial every day after.

She recalled meeting Senator Reynolds’ partner on the first day she attended the trial, but did not know who he was.

He approached her and asked if she knew where Ms Higgins was, but she had no idea.

“I assumed he had some connection to the Liberal Party,” she told the court.

Ms Maiden said she eventually worked out who he was through the DPP.

Ms Maiden told the court she met Senator Linda Reynolds’ partner Robert Reid at Bruce Lehrmann’s criminal trial. Picture: NewsWire / Sharon Smith

MAIDEN DENIES TALKS OF A PLAN TO ATTACK REYNOLDS

Ms Maiden denied Ms Higgins ever stated to her she had a desire to bring down the Morrison Government or Senator Reynolds.

“No, she never said that to me,” Ms Maiden told the court.

She said she communicated with senators in the chamber for the usual purpose of journalism and was trying to ascertain what was going on.

She told the court there was nothing remarkable about the communication she had with other politicians and she was going about her business as a journalist.

“I have been a political reporter for 25 years,” she said.

“I was just going about my business as a journalist.

‘Reynolds had been under a lot of pressure in parliament,” she said.

“She had given incorrect answers about the number of meetings she had with police, we were trying to get to the bottom of how many times she had met with police.

“We were trying to clarify information for stories.”
SENATOR REYNOLDS’ MEETING WITH HIGGINS

In the tape, Ms Maiden questioned Ms Higgins about how Senator Reynolds was during a meeting they had after the alleged rape.

In the tape, played to the court, Ms Higgins told her the senator had said “this is something women go through, and if you choose to go to the police, we need to know now”.

Ms Higgins could be heard on the tape saying that the senator and Fiona Brown were quite nice, but that the senator did not really like her because she had become a sudden problem for her.

She told Ms Maiden that she felt like Senator Reynolds and her chief of staff held the meeting so they could “tick a box”, like they had to have the conversation and say she could go to the police.

She said during the interview that Senator Reynolds never brought the allegation up with her again.

Mr Bennett questioned Ms Maiden about Ms Higgins’ memory of the meeting she had with Senator Reynolds and Ms Brown and how Ms Higgins said it was a blur.

Ms Maiden told the court when someone said “it was a blur” it didn’t mean they couldn’t remember anything from the conversation.

She said it was likely she remembered some parts and paraphrased others.

News.com.au political editor Samantha Maiden is giving evidence in the WA Supreme Court,

Ms Maiden told the court that Ms Higgins’ motivation for the interview was to make sure there was systemic change in the failures she saw in the parliamentary workplace.

Ms Maiden said breaking the story and raising the issues she raised improved the parliamentary workplace. “I thought they were very important (issues) and she went on to change the law,” she told the court.

Mr Bennett also questioned her about text messages with Ms Higgins, where she asked her if the senator should resign from her job.

Ms Maiden responded at the time there was a firestorm about how Senator Reynolds handled the matter.

She told the court she wanted Ms Higgins’ opinion because it would have been a significant story, but Ms Higgins had responded that she didn’t think the senator should resign because she was probably following instructions from the Prime Minister’s Office.

HIGGINS’ BATTLE FOR COUNSELLING

In the tape, Ms Higgins tells the reporter that she received Employee Assistance Program brochures from her employer, but she had to wait a month before she could get counselling.

By that time she had already sought counselling through the rape crisis centre but stopped going after a counsellor said to her, “you don’t seem like the type of person who would come forward”.

Ms Maiden told the court she was concerned about how much counselling Ms Higgins had and that she had to wait an extremely long time through the EAP service.

In a later part of the interview, Ms Higgins sounded upset, with Ms Maiden saying to her, “it wasn’t your fault”.

As the pair discussed Ms Higgins’ long wait for counselling, Ms Maiden said: “That is pretty f***ed”.

In the tape, Ms Higgins told Ms Maiden she did not think what happened to her was remarkable and that it happened all the time, but it was devastating, soul destroying and she thought about it constantly.

Ms Higgins said in the interview that the only thing people cared about was where it happened, and the reputation of Senator Reynolds and the Liberal Party.

Brittany Higgins (pictured with her mum Kelly) told Ms Maiden the alleged rape was soul destroying. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Gary Ramage

DEFAMATION BATTLE NEARS END

Senator Reynolds’ legal team will on Wednesday call news.com.au political editor Samantha Maiden to the stand as its final witness, while Ms Higgins’ team will call former Australian Federal Police assistant commissioner Leanne Close as its only witness, after it was announced Ms Higgins would not take the stand as originally planned.

Ms Maiden interviewed Ms Higgins and broke the story about her rape allegation on February 15, 2021.

Outside of court on Wednesday, Mr Bennett said without Mr Sharaz and Ms Higgins giving evidence, they had to go through evidence tendered to the federal court during Bruce Lehrmann’s defamation trial against Network Ten and find an interview with Lisa Wilkinson.

Now, he said, they had to go through Ms Maiden’s tape recordings and interviews, and needed one party to tender them.

“Unfortunately, it is Ms Maiden’s turn,” he said.

Senator Reynolds is suing Brittany Higgins and her husband David Sharaz for defamation in the WA Supreme Court.

Mr Bennett told reporters she would be appearing unusually represented by senior counsel and other solicitors in the room.

“It will be defensive rather than hostile,” he said.

The defence will call former Australian Federal Police commissioner Leanne Close to give evidence on Thursday.

Ms Higgins’ barrister, Rachael Young SC, told the court Ms Close would be called to test evidence given by Senator Reynolds’ former chief of staff, Fiona Brown.

Ms Brown’s evidence claimed she was not present during key parts of a meeting with Ms Close and Senator Reynolds on April 4, 2021.

Ms Young said they were deprived an opportunity to test Ms Brown’s recollection of events, as she did not take the stand, and they would like to call Ms Close to test that evidence.

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 Bruce Lehrmann.

The former political staffer was later charged with rape and faced trial in 2022, but the trial was aborted due to juror misconduct.

The charge was ultimately 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 he had raped Ms Higgins at Parliament House.

He is appealing the decision.