Court finds Brittany Higgins made false claims in media interviews
Justice Paul Tottle identified no fewer than 26 different ‘false or misleading aspects’ from Brittany Higgins’ media appearances.
Brittany Higgins’ account in media interviews about being raped in Parliament House contained “dishonest”, “objectively untrue and misleading” statements that could not solely be attributed to trauma, the WA Supreme Court has found.
The judgment delivered in Perth on Wednesday morning by Justice Paul Tottle made a series of scathing findings about the credibility of Ms Higgins, who has now been ordered to pay more than $340,000 in damages and interest to Linda Reynolds after the court found she had defamed her former employer.
While Ms Higgins did not testify in court during the five-week trial, Justice Tottle made extensive findings about her credibility based on evidence tendered during the case – identifying no fewer than 26 different “false or misleading aspects” from the media interviews when she first went public with her allegation she was raped by co-worker Bruce Lehrmann.
Justice Tottle found that in her efforts to lend credibility to the allegation of a political cover-up by Ms Reynolds, then a Liberal senator, over her alleged Parliament House rape, Ms Higgins had “demonstrated such an indifference to the truth that her account of the essential elements of the allegation can only be regarded as dishonest”.
He said that while he accepted that Ms Higgins had episodes of profound psychological distress arising from the rape and its aftermath, he was unable to rely on her evidence “in any respect” unless it was corroborated by other reliable evidence or was consistent with facts established by independent evidence.
“That the defendant’s evidence of the immediate aftermath of the rape was unreliable was entirely understandable,” Justice Tottle wrote.
“It is more difficult, however, to explain other aspects of the 2021 account given by the defendant, which were objectively untrue and misleading, as being attributable to the effects of trauma.”
The judge found that Ms Higgins’ version of events in the interviews she gave to journalists Samantha Maiden and Lisa Wilkinson differed so markedly from the objective facts that the differences could not sensibly be attributed to difficulties in recollection.
“Further, the extent to which the defendant embellished and speculated and passed her speculation off as fact rendered her account tendentious,” he wrote.
He identified at least eight examples of what he described as Ms Higgins’ “willingness to speculate and embellish”, particularly in regards to her claim that Ms Reynolds had tried to “cover up” Ms Higgins’ alleged rape.
Ms Reynolds was found by Justice Tottle to be an honest witness. He did, however, note that the former senator did have a politician’s tendency to respond to questions “with long answers in which she focused on the point she wished to put across rather than answering the question”.
He said it was also apparent that Ms Reynolds’ evidence was evidenced at least subconsciously by a desire to defend her conduct.
“These matters highlighted the need for a careful evaluation of the plaintiff’s evidence by reference to those facts established by other evidence and the inherent probabilities,” Justice Tottle said.
“As I have said, at times the plaintiff’s discursive approach to addressing questions was frustrating and, while there were aspects of her evidence that I have not accepted, my overall assessment is she was an honest witness though one determined to ensure her account of events was heard.”
