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- Watch the hearing live here from 10.15am (AEDT)
Network Ten will call a rape crisis counsellor and an Australian Federal Police officer to give evidence on Friday in Bruce Lehrmann’s high-stakes defamation case against the network over an interview with his former colleague Brittany Higgins.
The Federal Court heard on Thursday that Ten would call Kathryn Cripps, a rape crisis counsellor, to give evidence about her discussions with Higgins on April 8, 2019, days after Higgins alleges she was raped by Lehrmann in Parliament House on April 23. It is the first time any court has heard from Cripps about those discussions.
Brittany Higgins leaves the Federal Court in Sydney last Friday.Credit: James Brickwood
Lehrmann has vehemently denied raping Higgins and denied there was any sexual contact between the pair at all.
The network is also expected to call AFP officer Sarah Harman, who wrote in an email to Higgins on April 15 that year: “I understand your decision not to proceed with a police investigation at this time, you need to do what is right for you.” Harman told Higgins in the email that she had collected CCTV footage from The Dock hotel in Canberra from the evening of March 22, 2019.
Bruce Lehrmann outside the Federal Court in Sydney on Thursday.Credit: Steven Siewert
Higgins and Lehrmann, who were then advisers in the office of then-Liberal defence industry minister Linda Reynolds, were among government staffers who attended drinks at the hotel that night.
The lip-reader’s report
The court is also expected to hear legal argument on Friday, including about the admissibility of an expert lip-reader’s report that Ten wishes to tender that expresses an opinion on words allegedly spoken by Lehrmann and Higgins at The Dock, based on an observation of the CCTV footage.
Lehrmann’s legal team has foreshadowed that it will argue the report in its entirety is inadmissible.
The defamation suit
Lehrmann is suing Ten and its journalist Lisa Wilkinson over an interview with Higgins, aired on The Project on February 15, 2021, that he alleges defames him by suggesting he is guilty of raping Higgins in Parliament House in 2019.
Lisa Wilkinson arriving at court with her barrister, Sue Chrysanthou, SC.Credit: Steven Siewert
He was not named in Ten’s broadcast and a preliminary issue in the case is whether he was identified via other means.
If the court finds he was identified, Ten and Wilkinson are seeking to rely on a range of defences including truth, which would require the court to be satisfied to the civil standard – on the balance of probabilities – that he raped Higgins. In a criminal trial, a prosecutor must prove an accused’s guilt beyond reasonable doubt.
Ten and Wilkinson called Higgins to give evidence as part of their truth defence.
Sexual assault charge dropped
Lehrmann’s ACT Supreme Court trial for sexual assault was aborted last year due to juror misconduct. The charge against Lehrmann was later dropped altogether owing to concerns about Higgins’ mental health.
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