Bruce Lehrmann seen at Sydney Airport after sexual assault charge against Brittany Higgins dropped
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Bruce Lehrmann was seen speaking on the phone at Sydney airport in his first public appearance since his sexual assault charge was dropped.
Former Liberal employee Brittany Higgins had alleged that Lehrmann, a colleague at the time, had raped her in the parliamentary office of Minister Linda Reynolds in March 2019, an allegation he has consistently denied.
After a first trial collapsed due to jury misconduct, a second was scheduled for next year, but the charge was dropped on Friday after warnings that it could put a dangerous strain on Ms. Higgins.
Lehrmann wore a black face mask, a Ralph Lauren vest, dark pants and brown boots as he transported his luggage through the airport on Friday.
He was seen without his usual glasses while talking on the phone while carrying a brown bag, along with a black suitcase.
Earlier in the day, the ACT director of public prosecution, Shane Drumgold SC, had made his announcement that the case would no longer proceed.
Bruce Lehrmann was seen talking on the phone while donning a Ralph Lauren vest at Sydney airport in his first public appearance since sexual assault charges were dropped.
Mr Lehrmann is seen looking at his phone while out and about in Sydney on Friday.
Earlier on Friday, ACT Director of Public Prosecution Shane Drumgold SC announced that the case against Mr Lehrmann would be dropped for the sake of Brittany Higgins and her mental health.
Lehrmann was due to face a new trial in February, after the first trial was dropped in October.
It has now emerged that police believed there was insufficient evidence to prosecute Lehrmann after Higgins accused him of sexual assault, according to newspaper entries made by the most senior police officer in the case.
The ACT Police Director of Criminal Investigations, Detective Superintendent Scott Moller, stated in his notes that Mr Drumgold had decided to go ahead with the case regardless.
He wrote a conversation in which Superintendent Moller and his boss, ACT Deputy Police Chief Michael Chew, warned Drumgold about proceeding.
Mr Lehrmann was seen in Sydney on Friday, having spent time in Canberra for the trial.
Lehrmann will now not have to face another trial after the sexual assault charges against him were dropped.
Police believed there was insufficient evidence to prosecute Bruce Lehrmann after Brittany Higgins accused him of sexual assault, according to journal entries made by the most senior police officer in the case.
Mr Lehrmann had been accused of raping Ms Higgins in the parliamentary office of Minister Linda Reynolds in March 2019, an allegation he has continuously denied.
Superintendent Moller claimed there was “insufficient evidence”, while Chew said he would not pursue the case if it were up to him. the aussie informed.
‘DCPO stated ‘if it were my choice, I would not continue’. But it’s not my choice. There is too much political interference,” Detective Superintendent Moller wrote.
“I said, ‘That’s disappointing because I don’t think there’s enough evidence.'”
It was also revealed that police illegally handed over Ms Higgins’ protected evidence to Mr Lehrmann’s original defense attorneys on a USB stick in September 2021, with the team insisting they did not open the material.
Psychological counseling notes and a video of the police interview with Ms. Higgins were among the protected pieces of evidence illegally sent to Mr. Lehrmann’s legal team. news.com.au informed.
The attorneys who received the information were later replaced by attorney Steve Whybrow, who did not receive the documents.
The release of the confidential material led Drumgold to call it a “serious” problem and demanded that the police retrieve it.
He asked Superintendent Moller to ensure that the USB was examined to verify the claims made by Lehrmann’s attorneys at the time that they had not accessed the information.
“Considering that you are still in possession of highly confidential and protected information, are you going to return the memory card to AFP?” he said.
“It seems the least the AFP could do is send someone to pick it up. And my suggestion is that when you retrieve it, have the metadata examined to make sure that sensitive documents have not been accessed or copied.’
ACT Police Criminal Investigations Manager, Detective Superintendent Scott Moller (pictured), claimed in his notes that ACT Director of Public Prosecution Shane Drumgold SC had decided to pursue the case regardless
Drumgold announced Friday that the case against Lehrmann would be dropped for the good of Higgins and his mental health.
Superintendent Moller expanded on his concerns about the “insufficient evidence” written in his journal notes at an executive briefing in 2021.
He stated that the researchers had “serious concerns regarding the strength and reliability of [Ms Higgins’] evidence, but also, more importantly, his mental health and how any future prosecution may affect his well-being.”
Top police raised a number of concerns about the case during the executive briefing.
Their concerns included Ms Higgins refusing to hand over her mobile phone, deliberately deleting messages from a second phone and joking about wanting a “sex scandal”.
A police report claimed that Ms Higgins refused to hand over her phone at the request of authorities in February 2021.
She then gave her device to police in May when they found out that Ms Higgins and her ex-boyfriend Ben Dillaway had joked about wanting a sex scandal.
Ms Higgins’ refusal to hand over her mobile phone, deliberately deleted messages from a second phone and joked about wanting a “sex scandal” among concerns raised by investigators in an executive briefing.
The messages were sent on February 9, 2019, six weeks before Higgins alleged that Lehrmann raped her.
“The bar for what counts as a political sex scandal today is VERY low,” Ms Higgins wrote.
‘I want a sex scandal. I can be like whoa. Awesome. I didn’t think he had it in him,” Dillaway wrote.
‘Exactly! A sex scandal the party can be proud of. Another Barnaby but without the baby haha,” Higgins replied.
Superintendent Moller met with Ms. Higgins in July 2021 to update her on the investigation and questioned her about a text message she sent to her boyfriend David Sharaz.
Ms Higgins had sent the text to Mr Sharaz on May 21 saying she was “wiping her phone before the police do” and sent him an audio file.
Superintendent Moller said that Ms. Higgins explained that the audio files were recorded conversations with ministers and that Ms. Higgins did not want the police to find them because she feared that she had committed a crime by recording them.