Brittany Higgins has been ordered to pay 80% of her former boss Linda Reynold’s authorized prices from their high-profile defamation fight.
Final month, Western Australian supreme court docket decide Paul Tottle dominated the previous defence minister’s status was broken by a 2022 social media put up from Higgins’ associate David Sharaz, which Higgins responded to, and an Instagram story revealed by Higgins in July 2023.
The Instagram story shared a screenshot of headlines publicising Reynolds’ intentions to refer Higgins’ $2.445m private harm settlement to the federal anti-corruption physique, and accused Reynolds of mishandling her alleged rape and waging a marketing campaign of harassment.
The judgment marked the most recent chapter in a protracted authorized battle stemming from Higgins’ resolution to go public with allegations she was raped in a ministerial suite in Parliament Home by a former colleague, Bruce Lehrmann.
On Tuesday, the decide dominated Higgins ought to pay the vast majority of Reynolds’ authorized prices. The entire quantity is just not identified however is anticipated to be within the order of tons of of 1000’s of {dollars}.
Final week, Reynolds, who retired from federal parliament earlier this 12 months, was awarded $315,000 in damages plus $26,000 in interest from the defamation case.
The previous defence minister and West Australian senator argued the social media posts trashed her status, inflicting her immense misery and exacerbating a interval of sick well being.
The prices judgment launched on Tuesday revealed Higgins provided to settle the case in July final 12 months, if Reynolds agreed to a $200,000 cost to cowl authorized charges.
That supply, made simply days earlier than the defamation trial bought beneath method, would have concerned a confidential cost from Higgins’ dad and mom, a press release of “mutual remorse” from the 2 girls, and a cost from Reynolds to a girls’s charity or refuge in Queensland or Western Australia, value $10,000.
The proposed textual content of the assertion revealed within the prices judgment on Tuesday mentioned Reynolds “recognises that the disputes have resulted in damage and misery for Ms Higgins” and acknowledged that Higgins “genuinely believed that enough help had not been offered by her employer following the occasions of 23 March 2019”.
It mentioned Higgins acknowledged that Reynolds was distressed by social media posts and Reynolds and her workers believed they’d “offered applicable help to Ms Higgins”. The textual content mentioned each girls “conform to put these matter behind them and transfer on”.
However the decide mentioned the supply “didn’t present the plaintiff with any vindication of her status”.
Reynolds mentioned final month it was disappointing the case had taken greater than 4 years, a number of court docket actions and tens of millions of {dollars} to be resolved.
The defamation verdict got here greater than a 12 months after a federal court docket decide dominated towards Lehrmann in his defamation case towards Community Ten and high-profile journalist Lisa Wilkinson for airing Higgins’ sexual assault allegations towards him.
Justice Michael Lee discovered that Lehrmann had raped Higgins, on the stability of chances, inside Parliament Home in 2019.
Lehrmann is appealing against the verdict.
He denied the rape allegations and pleaded not responsible at his felony trial within the Australian Capital Territory supreme court docket, which was aborted. Prosecutors didn’t search a retrial as a result of issues about Higgins’ psychological well being.
Reynolds individually took the issue to the federal court, alleging that former attorney-general Mark Dreyfus had a battle of curiosity when he signed the settlement between Higgins and the Commonwealth. In June, the Nationwide Anti-Corruption Fee found “no corruption issue” with the $2.445m payout to Higgins, together with that “there was no inappropriate intervention” by Dreyfus.
