Linda Reynolds had tears in her eyes as she finished her testimony on Friday.
The Liberal senator will not appear in the Western Australian Supreme Court in Perth for the seventh day of her defamation trial against her former staff member Brittany Higgins because Parliament has already reconvened.
She was photographed in the Senate on Monday morning.
Ms Reynolds is suing Ms Higgins over a series of social media posts which she claims have damaged her reputation.
Ms Higgins claims Ms Reynolds failed to support her following her rape allegations against former colleague Bruce Lehrmann in 2019, and that she was forced to choose between filing a police complaint and her political career.
The social media posts at the heart of the case corroborate the claim that Ms Reynolds was not supportive.
Ms Reynolds denies the claims and told the court last week that she had tried to support Ms Higgins but had avoided contact with her about the attack because she did not see herself as an adviser.
Under cross-examination by Ms Higgins’ lawyer Rachael Young SC, the Senator said she was confident Ms Higgins was receiving counselling.
On Friday, Ms Reynolds broke down in tears as she told the court she blamed herself for the death of Labor Senator Kimberley Kitching.
Mrs. Kitching suffered a fatal heart attack on March 10, 2022. She was 52 years old.
Earlier this week, Ms Reynolds told the court that Ms Kitching approached her after morning prayers in Parliament House in 2021 and said she was sorry to have to deliver bad news.
Ms Kitching said Labor was aware of the rape that had taken place in Ms Reynolds’ office and would “rain hell on her”.
She learned of the rape through an anonymous email sent directly to her, which described the rape but did not mention Ms Higgins’ name.
Ms Kitching gave the letter to the Australian Federal Police, rather than to her Labor colleagues.
Ms Reynolds told the court that Penny Wong was angry with Ms Kitching when Labor discovered the rape because she had given the letter to the AFP instead of Kitching.
“Penny Wong said something about the impact of ‘Labor could have turned it into a weapon’,” Reynolds told the court.
She said Mrs Kitching was angry and upset about the situation.
On Friday, Reynolds told the court that Kitching denied informing her of Labor’s plan to use Higgins’ rape allegations as a weapon.
Ms Reynolds said Ms Kitching was ‘furious’.
When asked why she linked Ms Higgins’ rape claims to Ms Kitching’s death, Ms Reynolds began to cry uncontrollably.
“I wanted to tell the truth,” she said.
Ms Young asked: ‘Because it shows your contempt for the Labor Party?’
Ms Reynolds replied: ‘It shows my guilt. If I hadn’t revealed her trust to me … she was furious with me … which led to her being shut out by Labour.
‘I shouldn’t have told them, even in secret.
“She was so angry with me and she lost weight… I feel guilty for telling the senators what led to that.
I believe what I said…caused [Labor] to bully her to death. I carry a great sense of guilt with me.’