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Linda Reynolds will depend on key images of Brittany Higgins campaigning along with her in Perth through the 2019 federal election.
Ms Higgins has lengthy maintained Senator Reynolds and her former chief-of-staff Fiona Brown did little or no to assist her after her rape in March 2019.
She claimed as a lot in her $2.4million settlement deed with the Commonwealth in December 2022, which was rife with allegations towards her former bosses.
In response to the settlement declare, which was launched final yr by the Federal Court docket, Ms Higgins informed Ms Reynolds and Ms Brown she was raped they usually informed her to forged it apart.
‘Ms Brown made it clear by her phrases and manner that the occasions of twenty-two/23 March 2019 have to be put to at least one aspect and that [Ms Higgins] wanted to stay silent in regards to the sexual assault, as a way to maintain her job/profession,’ the deed learn.
‘In that context, [Ms Higgins] felt she had no alternative however to desert the pursuit of the grievance of sexual assault with the AFP.’
She claimed Ms Brown did not ask if she needed to report the incident to police, or if she wanted authorized recommendation.
Ms Higgins additionally has the long-held perception that she was given an ultimatum after she disclosed her allegations to Ms Reynolds and Ms Brown – she might both go along with the minister to Perth and assist marketing campaign for the forthcoming election, or she might go dwelling to the Gold Coast and go away Canberra ceaselessly.
Ms Reynolds and Ms Brown beforehand informed a court docket that they didn’t give her an ‘ultimatum’, however she did have the choice of going to Perth – so she went in April 2019, weeks after the assault.
In response to the deed, Ms Higgins was ‘required to principally work in her personal lodge room, seven days every week for six weeks’. She has by no means made that declare in a court docket earlier than.
(Pictured beneath: Linda Reynolds delivering a speech through the 2019 federal election. Brittany Higgins sits within the entrance row, in black)
Nevertheless, new images launched by the WA Supreme Court docket present Ms Higgins handing out flyers on the street, smiling along with her colleagues, and cheering throughout speeches whereas donning a blue Liberal polo shirt.
Ms Higgins could be seen posing for images with then-prime minister Scott Morrison, and watching Ms Reynolds ship a speech after the Coalition gained the election.
In court docket on Friday, Ms Reynolds’ lawyer Martin Bennett mentioned Mr Bennett mentioned the proof confirmed how Ms Higgins and her husband David Sharaz falsely created a story that there was no assist after her rape.
‘The very fact she had been raped was traumatic and horrible nevertheless it wanted one thing extra to draw the eye, to draw media curiosity, to draw the promotion of Ms Higgins, so she made it a political intercourse scandal,’ he informed the court docket.
‘That’s the fiction that wanted a villain and she or he forged Linda Reynolds in that function.’
The deed additionally says Ms Reynolds didn’t have interaction along with her in any respect through the election marketing campaign, however a photograph tendered to 2 courts confirmed Ms Higgins sitting subsequent to Ms Reynolds at her birthday in Perth.
In that picture, she was carrying the identical gown she was raped in.
(Pictured beneath: Then-prime minister Scott Morrison delivering a speech through the 2019 federal election. Brittany Higgins sits within the again row on the far left)
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