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Brittany Higgins notified one of the ABC’s most respected journalists that she planned to make a formal complaint against the federal police, according to leaked WhatsApp messages.
In a series of messages between Higgins and ABC 7.30’s Laura Tingle, obtained by Daily Mail Australia, Higgins accused the Australian Federal Police of going against protocol and releasing her mental health records and other private information to the legal team of Bruce Lehrmann, the former Liberal staffer she had accused of raping her in March 2019.
Shane Drumgold, Brittany Higgins, Bruce LehrmannCredit:
In 2021, Higgins publicly accused Lehrmann of rape, a charge he has always denied. Lehrmann’s trial was abandoned in October last year after juror misconduct and no findings were made against him.
Last week Australian Federal Police acting Assistant Commissioner Joanne Cameron told an inquiry, led by Walter Sofronoff, KC, that federal police detective Superintendent Scott Moller believed it was “clear” that Director of Public Prosecutions Shane Drumgold had tipped off Tingle that the complaint was about to be lodged.
But the leaked text messages contradict Moller’s supposition, although Higgins’ messages suggest that Drumgold had assisted her in making the complaint against police.
Higgins wrote to Tingle that she planned to make a formal complaint about the AFP for serving the “full breif [sic] of evidence to the defence” and for including “all my mental health records, session notes from the Canberra Rape Crisis Centre and full videos of my EIC [evidence in chief] interviews”.
“This is obviously a massive breach of privacy, unlawful and quite stressful,” she wrote.
Tingle responded sympathetically, saying the situation was “f—ing outrageous” and promising to keep the information “firmly in the vault”.
Weeks later Tingle and Higgins were in contact again about the formal complaint and in the lead-up to a story she published on April 27 about the complaint, the ABC journalist contacted the police for comment, which prompted Moller to suspect Drumgold of the leak.
Higgins, Higgins’ spokeswoman, Tingle, the ABC, Lehrmann’s spokesman, Drumgold and the federal police were all contacted for comment for this story.
The ACT government late last year ordered an inquiry led by Sofronoff into the aborted trial following a dramatic deterioration of the relationship between Drumgold and the AFP.
Cameron also told the inquiry last week that she feared investigators speaking with Lehrmann’s lawyers during the trial would fuel rumours of police conspiring with the defence.
“I held the concern that, at the very least, whenever these sorts of interactions were occurring, if they became known to others, there would be judgments made, not even knowing what the conversations were about … others would make a judgment unfairly against my officers,” Cameron said.
In her written statement, Cameron said the constant media attention generated a “trust no one mentality”.
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