Network Ten requests Bruce Lehrmann pay $200,000 security against cost of appeal

The federal court in May ordered Bruce Lehrmann to pay most of Network Ten’s legal costs because he brought the case on a ‘knowingly false premise’. Photograph: Jono Searle/AAP

Network Ten is asking a court to dismiss Bruce Lehrmann’s appeal against his defamation defeat if he cannot pay the broadcaster $200,000 in security.

In April, Justice Michael Lee found the former Liberal staffer was not defamed by Lisa Wilkinson and Network Ten when The Project broadcast an interview with Brittany Higgins on 15 February 2021 in which she alleged she was raped by a staffer. Lee found on the balance of probabilities Lehrmann raped Higgins on a minister’s couch in Parliament House in 2019.