{"id":232910,"date":"2025-10-22T16:44:50","date_gmt":"2025-10-22T16:44:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/232910\/"},"modified":"2025-10-22T16:44:50","modified_gmt":"2025-10-22T16:44:50","slug":"former-political-staffer-abandons-appeals-over-costly-defamation-loss-to-her-former-boss-linda-reynolds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/232910\/","title":{"rendered":"Former political staffer abandons appeals over costly defamation loss to her former boss Linda Reynolds"},"content":{"rendered":"

Brittany Higgins has abandoned appeals against her costly defamation battle loss to her former boss, ex-Liberal senator Linda Reynolds.<\/p>\n

Reynolds sued Higgins over a series of social media posts the former defence minister believed damaged her reputation.<\/p>\n

Western Australia<\/a>‘s Supreme Court in August found the posts were defamatory and awarded damages of $315,000 plus $26,109 interest to Reynolds.\"BrittanyBrittany Higgins has abandoned appeals against her costly defamation battle loss to her former boss, ex-Liberal senator Linda Reynolds. (Rhett Wyman)<\/p>\n

Higgins was also ordered to pay 80 per cent of Reynolds’ legal costs, which are estimated to be over $1 million.<\/p>\n

The former political staffer in September, appealed Justice Paul Tottle’s damages award and finding that she breached a 2021 deed of settlement between the pair with an Instagram post referring to her being a defamation victim.<\/p>\n

She also challenged the costs order in another appeal.<\/p>\n

\"Ex-LiberalEx-Liberal senator Linda Reynolds. (AAP)<\/p>\n

A court spokesperson confirmed discontinuance notices for both appeals were filed on Monday.<\/p>\n

It comes about a week after Reynolds launched bankruptcy proceedings against Higgins to recoup the costs awarded in her defamation win.<\/p>\n

Reynolds filed a creditor’s petition in the Federal Court, claiming Higgins “failed to comply” with a bankruptcy notice issued to her several weeks earlier.<\/p>\n

Higgins’ husband David Sharaz has also been served with bankruptcy proceedings by Reynolds.<\/p>\n

He was also found to have defamed the former politician and was ordered to pay $85,000 in damages plus interest and costs.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Higgins previously apologised to Reynolds after the former defence minister emerged victorious from the duo’s high-profile five-week defamation trial, which ended in September 2024.<\/p>\n

Justice Tottle found Higgins’ social media posts carried an array of imputations.<\/p>\n

They included Reynolds engaged in a campaign of harassment against Higgins, mishandled her rape allegation and engaged in questionable conduct during Bruce Lehrmann’s aborted criminal trial for rape.<\/p>\n

The 360-page judgment made factual findings about the events involving Reynolds and Higgins, including her alleged 2019 rape and the events in the years after it.<\/p>\n

Higgins made 26 false or misleading statements in media interviews after her alleged sexual assault, it said.<\/p>\n

She alleges former co-worker Lehrmann raped her in the senator’s ministerial suite.<\/p>\n

A Federal Court judge overseeing a defamation case launched by Lehrmann against Network Ten found Higgins was, on the balance of probabilities, raped by her former co-worker in the office.<\/p>\n

Lehrmann is appealing that finding.<\/p>\n

He has always denied the rape allegation and his criminal trial was derailed by juror misconduct.<\/p>\n

Support is available by calling 1800 RESPECT on 1800 737 732 or National Sexual Abuse and Redress Support Service on 1800 211 028.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Brittany Higgins has abandoned appeals against her costly defamation battle loss to her former boss, ex-Liberal senator Linda…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":100208,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,41,39,42,40],"class_list":["post-232910","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/232910","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=232910"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/232910\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/100208"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=232910"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=232910"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=232910"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}