Taylor Auerbach ‘promoted, given pay rise’ after Bruce Lehrmann massages
Taylor Auerbach says he was promoted shortly after spending thousands of company dollars on Thai massages for himself and Bruce Lehrmann, amidst explosive claims he watched Lehrmann order cocaine and Google sex workers.
Former Spotlight producer Taylor Auerbach says he was promoted and given a pay rise shortly after he spent thousands of company dollars on Thai massages for himself and Bruce Lehrmann, amid explosive claims he watched the former Liberal staffer order cocaine while at a Potts Point restaurant and Google sex workers he later invoiced to Seven.
Seven was hauled over the coals at the Federal Court on Thursday, and instructed to provide an explanation about why it could produce just one documented communication between Mr Lehrmann and producers from the months leading up to his exclusive Spotlight interview.
The network was also called on to explain how it could now respond to a subpoena issued in the middle of last year, for which it previously claimed it had no documents to produce.
Seven has taken centre stage in Mr Lehrmann’s defamation action against Network 10 and presenter Lisa Wilkinson, after Auerbach signed affidavits claiming Seven gave Mr Lehrmann expensive perks in attempts to persuade him to sign over his exclusive interview rights last year.
Auerbach also says Mr Lehrmann leaked confidential documents from his criminal rape trial, which was abandoned – including thousands of messages between Brittany Higgins and her ex-boyfriend – to Spotlight, in breach of obligations to the court.
A Seven spokesperson said the network was “appalled by the allegations made in recent days” and “acted appropriately at all times”.
Under cross-examination on Thursday, Auerbach said he witnessed Mr Lehrmann order a bag of cocaine while at Potts Point restaurant Franca in January last year, which he later took back to a hotel room Seven was paying for.
“Mr Lehrmann had over dinner purchased a bag of cocaine while we were dining at Franca, and when we got upstairs to the room, he pulled that out and started to put it on a plate,” Auerbach told the court. “Then he started talking to me about a prospective Spotlight story and his desire to order prostitutes to the Meriton that night, and began Googling a series of websites to try and make that happen.”
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At the time, Auerbach said that he had been assigned as Mr Lehrmann’s “babysitter” to try to persuade him to do an interview with Spotlight.
Auerbach told the court during the night he texted his colleague, former Spotlight producer Steve Jackson, that “Bruce was on the warpath again”.
“I think I used the words ‘This is f..ked’,” he said
He later told the court Mr Lehrmann invoiced Seven for expenses incurred that night, and Spotlight executive producer Mark Llewellyn gave “verbal approval” to satisfy the invoice.
However, he said he did not see receipt of payment from Seven.
“He got in touch with me to say that his bank account was dry after the - for want of a better word - bender and asked if there was a way that we’d be able to compensate him for (his expenses in Sydney),” he said.
Auerbach first made headlines late last month when reports emerged that an unnamed Seven producer – later revealed to be Auerbach – used a corporate credit card to buy expensive Thai massages for himself and Mr Lehrmann in November 2022. Mr Lehrmann has denied getting a massage.
On Thursday, Auerbach said he resigned from Spotlight in the days after the credit card misuse, writing an email to his then boss, Llewellyn, disclosing the incident but not mentioning Mr Lehrmann’s name. He told the court Llewellyn gave him a second chance and, one week later, he was promoted and given a pay rise.
Mr Lehrmann’s barrister, Matthew Richardson SC, questioned why Auerbach did not mention Mr Lehrmann had been party to a massage when tendering his resignation to Llewellyn.
He also suggested the only reason Auerbach mentioned in affidavits to the Ten proceedings that Mr Lehrmann got a massage “was to humiliate” him. Auerbach responded: “No, that’s wrong.”
Just before the massage news broke in March, NSW Police Commissioner Karen Webb came under media scrutiny for appointing Jackson as media adviser.
Auerbach on Thursday conceded to “backgrounding” journalists against Jackson during the media frenzy, and said he hated Jackson. He admitted to circulating to journalists naked photos of an unnamed woman Jackson interviewed in late 2019, and said he did so without her consent.
He denied he had been questioned by police on the matter.
Auerbach told the court that in the lead-up to Spotlight’s interview with Mr Lehrmann, Llewellyn sent him images of messages between Ms Higgins and Sydney Morning Herald columnist Peter FitzSimons.
Auerbach claims Llewellyn sent the images while the latter was at Mr Lehrmann’s house.
“We were in the scripting stage (and) Mr Llewellyn asked me to script the section of the program relating to the book deal and also the Sofronoff inquiry,” Auerbach said. “To assist me in that, he sent me a bundle of photographs … via WhatsApp.”
He was unable to produce the WhatsApp messages, just the photographs sent by Llewellyn.
Auerbach said Mr Lehrmann gave Spotlight other confidential court documents, such as a police statement of facts, to use as part of his interview, in contradiction to Mr Lehrmann telling the court he “just gave an interview” to Seven.
Auerbach maintained claims made in his affidavit that Seven lawyer Richard Keegan instructed him to “delete any materials that could be damaging for Seven”, despite Mr Richardson suggesting this conversation never occurred.
Earlier, Ten barrister Matthew Collins KC told the court it “beggars belief” Seven had only been able to produce one communication between Mr Lehrmann and producers in the months leading up to his interview.
Seven handed documents to the bench on Thursday morning in response to two subpoenas issued by Ten in the middle of last year, seeking “all communications or documents evidencing communications between Mr Lehrmann, or anyone on his behalf, and the Seven Network”.
This was despite the network previously claiming there were no documents to produce in response to the subpoena. Dr Collins took issue with the limited documents supplied by Seven, and indicated he might wish to cross-examine Seven executives on their compliance with the subpoena.
“We can see … one document evidencing your communication between Mr Lehrmann, the star of the exclusive interview, over a seven-month … preparation period,” Dr Collins said. “That beggars belief. One can imagine what the explanation might be, but Your Honour might well expect an explanation to be provided in respect of that in any affidavit, to save cross-examination.”
The court heard Seven’s outgoing corporate director, Bruce McWilliam, signed an affidavit saying the network initially only conducted “limited searches” of communications between Mr Lehrmann and the Spotlight production team, relying on “untested assurance” from Llewelyn there were no communications to produce.
Justice Michael Lee instructed lawyers for Seven to sign an affidavit “as to why additional documents have been produced” despite not being provided when asked last year. Court will resume at 10.15am on Friday, with further cross-examination of Auerbach.
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