Linda Reynolds vs Brittany Higgins defamation case: Higgins and David Sharaz ‘mocked’ Reynolds, court hears

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Linda Reynolds vs Brittany Higgins defamation case: Higgins and David Sharaz ‘mocked’ Reynolds, court hears

Brittany Higgins and her now husband David Sharaz “mocked” their nemesis Linda Reynolds after it was revealed she was taking a significant break from Parliament because of health problems, the senator’s lawyer has claimed.

The high-stakes defamation trial pitting the former Defence Minister and her former junior staffer against each other in WA’s Supreme Court will finish on Wednesday, after five weeks of at times startling evidence.

Direct evidence that had been scheduled from Ms Higgins did not eventuate after her lawyers said they would not be calling her partly because of concerns over her health.

But that has not prevented her words from being used for and against her in the legal arguments claiming she used social media posts to ******* and defame the outgoing senator in 2022 and 2023.

Re-opening his closing, Ms Reynolds’ lawyer Martin Bennett dragged up messages sent to and fro in March 2021, after it was revealed the Senator was not returning to work for another three weeks.

“Linda has delayed her return to work hahhahahaha 3 weeks,” Mr Sharaz wrote. “She’s done. You don’t take three weeks and come back.”

Weeks later, in another message, Mr Sharaz wrote: “***** ***** Linda … You awful human.”

Mr Bennett argued that was illustrative and indicative of their attitude towards Ms Reynolds.

“They mocked the fact that the ******* initiated and my client has caused her to go on ***** leave,” he said.

And in pointing to the draft excerpt of Ms Higgins’ book, initially titled ‘#NotJustADaughter’ — Mr Bennett claimed that showed the coordinated nature of the couple’s manoeuvres around Ms Higgins’ going public.

“Here, I’m in the mud with the pigs fighting for control of the daily news cycle, throwing mud. A WhatsApp here, a voicemail there,” she wrote in one passage.

“We had become quite a twosome when it came to game planning. My experience as a media adviser, David’s experience as a producer; together we understood how the gallery media sphere operated,” she recounted in another.

Ms Higgins is fighting her former boss Senator Linda Reynolds over a series of social media posts from 2023 that the ex-defence minister believes damaged her reputation.

On Tuesday, it was revealed in court that Sky News political commentator Peta Credlin helped Ms Higgins draft a statement outlining the former staffer’s plan to reform the way parliament handled ******* harassment.

The senator’s lawyer Martin Bennett told a Perth court a statement purporting to be Ms Higgins’, that her lawyer Rachael Young read during her closing submissions, was not written by her.

“It wasn’t Ms Higgins’ voice at all,” he told the WA Supreme Court on Tuesday in reference to the statement from February 19, 2021.

“The draft … was prepared by (Ms Higgins’ now-husband David) Sharaz and it was edited by Peta Credlin.”

Mr Bennett read out a series of messages between Mr Sharaz and Ms Credlin in which he said: “Thank you again for your help. Please see below the initial draft, feel free to completely re-work wherever you see fit”.

Mr Bennett said Ms Credlin — former prime minister Tony Abbott’s chief of staff — provided suggestions to rework paragraphs, asking Mr Sharaz to call her so she could talk him through the changes.

He also said Mr Sharaz sent the edited document to journalist Lisa Wilkinson.

“This idea that statements made by Ms Higgins after the date of The Project interview and the (Samantha) Maiden article corroborate her motive in making those statements … needs to be treated with caution because what appears to be Ms Higgins’ voice was the voice of people jumping on a bandwagon,’ Mr Bennett said.

Ms Young finished her closing argument for Ms Higgins’ defence by saying the senator had repeatedly stated she was protecting Ms Higgins’ agency in defence of her handling of the alleged *****.

“But Ms Higgins had no agency when she was ****** in March 2019 on the couch in Senator Reynolds’ private office,” she said.

Ms Young read an extract from Ms Higgins’ statement in which she said she had re-engaged with the *********** Federal Police and would proceed with a formal complaint over her alleged *****.

In it, Ms Higgins also said: “The prime minister has repeatedly told the parliament that I should be given agency going forward”.

“I don’t believe that agency was provided to me over the past two years but I seize it now and have advised the Prime Minister’s Office that I expect a voice in framing the scope and terms of reference for a new and significant review into the conditions for all ministerial and parliamentary staff.

“From the outset, I have been driven by my ******* to ensure that no other person would have to go through the trauma that I experienced during my time in Parliament House.

“I was ******* repeatedly, but I now have my voice, and I am determined to use it to ensure that this is never allowed to happen to another member of staff again.”

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