Court Hears Alleged Lehrmann Victim’s Phone Records Show Missing Messages

Bruce Lehrmann, a former staffer for the Liberal party, is urging a forensic specialist to scrutinize the phone of a woman he allegedly raped, citing inconsistencies in the prosecution’s evidence.

Lehrmann’s lawyer, Zali Burrows, informed Judge Dennis Lynch that a second analysis of the complainant’s phone yielded a report that differed from the initial one.

“There are some crucial words missing between the first and second phone data extractions that are noted in the statement of facts,” Burrows explained.

The court heard that a second data extraction was necessary after the original was lost due to a detective’s hard drive failure.

Currently on bail and yet to formally respond to the charges, Lehrmann is accused of raping the woman twice in the early hours of October 10, 2021.

They met during the previous night at a strip club in Toowoomba, west of Brisbane.

Lehrmann previously indicated he would contest the charges.

Burrows said she had applied before another judge to force police to provide an “unredacted” second report, but she had been told there was a problem with accessing the original encrypted data.

“If this data is lost all over again we would like to address it in our stay application,” she said.

“We would like our own, independent forensic IT expert to have an opportunity to do a brand-new extraction of the phone, which would obviously be monitored and supervised by police.”

A copy of the phone data would be obtained today and should be provided before the end of the week, prosecutor Caroline Marco said.

“Unfortunately the delay was that our investigating officer was on leave,” Marco said.

She said prosecutors would resist an application for an independent expert to download data from the alleged victim’s phone.

Judge Lynch said he would wait for the second report on the phone before considering any such application.

Lehrmann’s bail was continued and the case was adjourned until November 17.

Support is available by calling 1800 RESPECT on 1800 737 732 or National Sexual Abuse and Redress Support Service 1800 211 028.