Brittany Higgins told a journalist she half-expected police to raid her house as they tried to "extract more information" out of her, saying senior officers were "not fans".
The former Liberal Party staffer's strained relationship with investigators is detailed in a transcript of a recorded conversation, which has been published by a board of inquiry.
The inquiry is examining how authorities handled Ms Higgins' allegation that Bruce Lehrmann raped her at Parliament House when the pair worked for Senator Linda Reynolds in 2019.
Mr Lehrmann maintains his innocence after the rape charge levelled at him was discontinued last year in the wake of a mistrial.
While police were weighing up whether to charge Mr Lehrmann, officers interviewed Ms Higgins twice.
In June 2021, a week after the second interview, Ms Higgins had a recorded conversation with news.com.au political editor Samantha Maiden.
Ms Higgins told the journalist, who broke the story of the alleged rape, that "the normal detectives" on her case had been great but a superintendent had made things "difficult".
She then "very much" agreed with Ms Maiden's suggestion that senior police were "paranoid about media".
"It's just the superintendent and, I forget his name, but yeah," Ms Higgins told Ms Maiden.
"They're, they are not fans. But that's OK."
Ms Maiden went on to ask Ms Higgins how much longer the police investigation was likely to take.
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"They keep saying it is going to be a couple weeks and then they just keep extracting more information out of me," Ms Higgins replied.
"At this point I have no privacy.
"I am half-expecting them to like raid my house next."
A partial transcript of the conversation shows Ms Higgins later told Ms Maiden "the police and I don't love each other".
"I think they're going to charge but I don't think that they feel like there's enough," she said.
Superintendent denies being 'unsupportive'
The superintendent Ms Higgins spoke of was Scott Moller, who has admitted to the inquiry she may have thought he was "scolding" her when he warned her against speaking to the media during the investigation.
But Detective Superintendent Moller insisted he was simply being honest and candid about the potential for publicity to derail the prosecution that ultimately eventuated.
He also denied the suggestion of Mark Tedeschi KC, counsel for the ACT Director of Public Prosecutions, that police had been "completely unsupportive" of Ms Higgins.
As his evidence drew to a close, Detective Superintendent Moller launched a passionate defence of the police investigation and declared he was proud of his fellow investigators.
He said while there had been a feeling within the investigative team that there was insufficient evidence to prosecute Mr Lehrmann, his colleagues had "pushed forward against their own beliefs" once told of the decision to take the case to court.
"I don't think they lost objectivity because when we decided to go through and charge, that was our direction," Detective Superintendent Moller told the inquiry last week.
Public hearings on hiatus
The inquiry is currently having a break from public hearings, which are set to resume on Thursday.
Mr Lehrmann's former barrister, John Korn, is set to be the next witness to give evidence.
Mr Korn was forced to withdraw from the case before Mr Lehrmann stood trial.
But in a written statement to the inquiry, he has detailed a heated phone call in which he tried unsuccessfully to convince the Director of Public Prosecutions, Shane Drumgold SC, to dissuade Ms Higgins from speaking at the National Press Club ahead of the trial.
Mr Tedeschi has said Mr Korn's oral evidence is likely to take "five minutes or less".
Mr Korn is expected to be followed by ACT Victims of Crime Commissioner Heidi Yates, who faced criticism from police for taking an active role as Ms Higgins' support person.
Senior police later backed down from their criticism of Ms Yates, acknowledging she was entitled to act as a support person and that she had in fact assisted investigators.
