Lisa Wilkinson has launched a new attempt to overturn part of a ruling against her in the Bruce Lehrmann defamation case.
Wilkinson’s lawyers filed a notice of challenge in the Federal Court on her behalf on Wednesday, arguing that Judge Michael Lee was wrong to rule against her and Network Ten on April 15.
Lehrmann sued the TV host and network for defamation over a 2021 episode of The Project, during which Brittany Higgins publicly alleged that he raped her in Parliament in 2019.
He was not named in the broadcast, but claimed that friends and colleagues were able to identify him as her rapist.
In his findings earlier this year, Judge Lee found that Lehrmann had raped Ms Higgins under the civil standard of the balance of probabilities. He filed an appeal to overturn that sentence on May 31.
Wilkinson and Network Ten won the primary truth defense in the case because of the findings against Lehrmann.
However, they lost a separate defense of qualified privilege when the judge found that Wilkinson and The Project team did not act reasonably in preparing the episode for broadcast.
Pictured left, Lisa Wilkinson leaves the Federal Court in April with her lawyer, Sue Chrysanthou SC.
Pictured: A bruise that Brittany Higgins claimed was from her rape. The court heard there was no evidence of the bruising before 2021, two years after she was raped.
The challenge brief was filed in response to Lehrmann’s appeal and asked the court to reconsider rulings that did not favor Wilkinson.
If Wilkinson’s notice of dissent was successful, it would restore his reputation.
According to the notice, Wilkinson argued that Judge Lee made a series of errors in his judgments defending the truth regarding Ms. Higgins’ credibility and Lehrmann’s consciousness of guilt.
The notice went on to detail errors in the qualified privilege rulings, alleging that the judge “did not give sufficient or any weight” to a variety of factors surrounding Wilkinson’s work and career.
Wilkinson maintains that Judge Lee ignored her “experience with survivors of sexual assault”, especially given that she had met Ms Higgins several times and had “experience” on the subject.
It was further suggested that Judge Lee did not distinguish between the conduct and decisions made by Network Ten and those made by Wilkinson, because she was an employee with several superiors.
In his judgment, Judge Lee criticized Ten and Wilkinson for failing to properly investigate a photo of a bruise that Higgins said was the result of the 2019 rape.
The court heard there was no evidence the bruise photo existed before January 2021, the day she met Wilkinson for the first time.
Bruce Lehrmann appears in court on April 15, the day he lost his defamation trial.
In the notice, Wilkinson argued that Judge Lee did not give much weight to the fact that Wilkinson relied on Ms Higgins’ legal statement as evidence that the photograph and bruise were the result of her rape.
It was further suggested that Wilkinson had no control over when the network contacted Lehrmann for comment.
The project’s producer, Angus Llewellyn, emailed Lehrmann on a Friday afternoon, three days before the broadcast, and again on the day of the broadcast.
Judge Lee was not satisfied that he received those emails and ruled against Wilkinson and Ten, but Wilkinson has now argued that Judge Lee made a mistake when he found that Lehrmann did not receive at least one of those emails.
Wilkinson’s notice also asked the court to consider the fact that she believed he had been given adequate time to respond and had no reason to believe otherwise.
The notice claimed that Judge Lee misinterpreted the introduction to The Project episode, when Wilkinson said: “Claims of rape, obstacles to a police investigation and a young woman forced to choose between her career and the pursuit of justice.”
The judge concluded that Higgins was not forced to choose between her career and the pursuit of justice and that there were no obstacles to a police investigation.
He referred to those claims as conspiratorial.
Wilkinson’s notice was prepared by her lawyer Sue Chrysanthou SC, who represented her during the trial. She has billed Network Ten $1.8 million to cover her legal fees.
The appeal has not yet been heard in court.
Lehrmann may have to cover security costs before any appeal. Failure to pay may result in the appeal not proceeding.
