657 On 27 March, Mr Dillaway came up from Melbourne to go to Ms Higgins and was giving her help – round this time Ms Higgins was saying her “essential concern” was that she didn’t need anyone to know what had happened and she also “had issues about turning into identified because the woman who was raped in Parliament, and she was frightened about how it could affect her job and her career” (T1223.33-35; T1224.16-26). 683 Doing the perfect I can, and having taken the evidence of Ms Cripps into account, I consider it likely that Ms Higgins maintained her place, that she had articulated virtually instantly to Mr Dillaway, that her primary concern was that she did not want anybody to know what had occurred and she had considerations about “becoming identified as the woman who was raped in Parliament, and she was frightened about how it may have an effect on her job and her profession” (T1223.33-35; T1224.16-26). If the complainant desires the investigation to proceed, the following stage involves a skilled police officer acquiring proof of the allegations by conducting a videotaped “Evidence-in-Chief interview”.
Despite Ms Higgins making it plain she did not wish to proceed, the AFP then went to some lengths to ensure the complaint was concluded appropriately. Fiona then sasid “how ought to we deal with the difficulty of Bruce leaving a junior member of staff behind in that state?” I mentioned I don’t perceive what you might be referring to. It could be emotionally taxing on her and it would be difficult to achieve, like, a conviction of – of Bruce from what happened. She advised the employment of Bruce Lehrmann is to e discussed with him as he has lastly responded to an e mail can she meet with him? 655 Secondly, not recorded in Ms Brown’s notes, were conferences with Mr Payne which came about earlier than Mr Lehrmann had left the workplace. 695 On 15 April, Agent Cleaves had left a message to arrange to view the CCTV footage and recorded a conversation she had with the SACAT that Ms Higgins did not wish to proceed and had not referred to as the CRCC (T1397.19-32).
Mr Stephen Frost, part of MinWing Support, noticed Ms Brown and through this dialog, she found the Ministerial personal office had also been cleaned on the previous Saturday, after Ms Higgins had left it. Network Ten’s submission equating the actions of Ms Brown in this regard as akin to protecting a paedophile just isn’t solely profoundly unfair but additionally legally misconceived. 690 On this regard she was hardly atypical. But I believe that very thought fills her with as a lot dread because it does me. I just think there was plenty of competing issues occurring. One solely has to recall her telephone dialog with Ms Maiden when she “was actually relieved” as a result of given Mr Lehrmann’s account, there can be no want “to have this very nuanced debate about consent and alcohol and all this sort of stuff” (T703.22-27), and in the first interview with the Project crew, when she mentioned she thought a discovering of sexual assault had occurred may be able to obtained on the civil commonplace, however not to the criminal standard (T1015.19-24). One may have substituted for the other, less of a change than it appears to be like.
Remember that you just don’t should be an expert. I only learn a case note entry on my job in relation to it, so I don’t know what the – I wasn’t current for the telephone name. It suffices to note they acted appropriately, professionally and requested “in-depth” questions (T1387.5). As is evident from the contemporaneous records, this occurred by motive of actions commenced as early as 12:40pm on 23 March, involving the Chief of Staff of DPS (who had initially been referred to as whereas Ms Higgins was still within the Ministerial Suite), as “somebody may have vomited in there” (MC (at 13, 19, 22)). Ms Brown gave the cleaning no thought on the time, however when she later grew to become conscious that there had been unauthorised after-hours access to the Minister’s workplace, she called “MinWing Support” to make enquries as to the small print. When the AFP officers came as much as the office, Ms Brown noticed they “seemed like cops” and formed the view that it could be better for Ms Higgins’ privateness to relocate the assembly to the AFP places of work in the basement of Parliament House. It’ll also be recalled that Ms Brown gave proof, which I accept, that she considered Mr Hawke and Senator Reynolds have been being forceful in directing Ms Brown to report the allegation “as a result of they had been frightened about overlaying themselves” (T2126.42).