Key Points
- Alleged rapist Bruce Lehrmann was described as a "fundamentally dishonest man" in court.
- Lehrmann is suing Network Ten and Lisa Wilkinson over a broadcast aired in 2021.
- Counsel representing Lehrmann will give closing submissions on Friday.
This article contains references to rape and sexual assault.
Broadcaster Ten has accused Bruce Lehrmann of making bizarre and absurd lies around his alleged rape of Brittany Higgins, in closing statements of their defence in the high-profile defamation trial.
Lehrmann brought defamation action against Ten and journalist Lisa Wilkinson over a February 2021 interview with Higgins broadcast on the Project, which did not name the former Liberal staffer, but which alleged a rape had occurred in Parliament House.
Lehrmann denies he assaulted Higgins and asserts that no intercourse took place.
Lawyers for Network Ten have rejected Lehrmann's claims that nothing sexual happened between him and Higgins in Senator Linda Reynolds' office at Parliament House in March 2019.
Ten and Wilkinson's lawyers make closing submissions
Giving closing submissions in the defamation case brought by Lehrmann, Ten's barrister Matthew Collins KC said the former Liberal staffer was evasive and defensive when giving evidence.
He made "bizarre" and "absurd" lies about what he claimed happened, the barrister told Justice Michael Lee.
"Mr Lehrmann was revealed to be a fundamentally dishonest man who was prepared to say or do anything he perceived to advance his interests," Collins said.
Wilkinson's barrister Sue Chrysanthou SC said Lehrmann had been "locked in" to his lie that nothing untoward happened when he first spoke to police in April 2021 and then a series of further lies flowed from that.
"One has to wonder if Mr Lehrmann is just a compulsive liar ... or whether the lies that have been told were directed to covering up the fact that he had sex with Ms Higgins," she said.
Collins argued Lehrmann was not identifiable due to The Project report except for among a small group of individuals who already knew of an alleged incident in Parliament House almost two years earlier.
Even if Lehrmann succeeded in his defamation case, any damages he received would be limited as a result, he said.
Chrysanthou went further saying that if there was a small group of people who could be the accused individual mentioned in the report, then that story was incapable of carrying an imputation of guilt.
'They weren't there to play Scrabble,' Ten's lawyer argues
Collins urged Lee to find sexual intercourse, whether consensual or non-consensual, occurred that night given Higgins was later seen by a security guard naked and passed out on the minister's couch.
"They weren't there to play Scrabble," Collins said.
"There's a limited universe of things that plausibly happened."
If the judge found consensual sex had occurred, it was "game over" for Lehrmann because of his continual denials that anything happened, he submitted.
Collins said Higgins, on the other hand, had given compelling, distressing and believable evidence about the rape allegation.
She also made appropriate admissions about mistakes in her prior versions of events, he said.
The judge was simply required to decide whether the core allegation of rape occurred, Collins said.
Ten did not need to prove claims Higgins felt forced to remain silent as none of her former superiors — Senator Reynolds, chief of staff Fiona Brown or Senator Michaelia Cash — were suing for defamation in this case, Collins said.
Ten is also running a justification defence in which it has to prove it was reasonable in publishing an article of public interest.
Lee might have to grapple with what, if any, damages Lehrmann receives if the rape claim is shown to be true but Higgins' claims about the actions of others in Parliament House are found to be false.
Chrysanthou said her client played a "very limited role" and had no decision-making power in actually creating the published material finally aired in The Project report.
Counsel representing Lehrmann will give closing submissions on Friday.
Lehrmann's trial in the ACT Supreme Court on a charge of raping Higgins was derailed by juror misconduct.
Lehrman pled not guilty to the charges. No finding of fact has been made by a court in relation to the criminal charges.
Prosecutors did not seek a second trial, citing concerns for Higgins' mental health.
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