A News Corp Australia lawyer went to the United States trying to “dig up dirt” on Geoffrey Rush to use against him in the actor’s defamation lawsuit against the Daily Telegraph, a judge has been told.

“It is a highly distressing situation for him,” Rush’s lawyer, Sue Chrysanthou, said on Monday in a case management hearing in the federal court.

Rush is suing the tabloid’s publisher and reporter Jonathon Moran over articles about allegations he behaved inappropriately toward fellow cast member Eryn Jean Norvill in the Sydney Theatre Company production of King Lear in 2015-16.

The 67-year-old actor says the articles made him out to be a pervert and predator and suggested his alleged misconduct was so serious that the STC resolved never to work with him again.

Chrysanthou on Monday said the actor was also claiming aggravated damages which can be awarded if a plaintiff shows he has suffered extra distress by inappropriate or unjustified conduct of the defendant.

She said Rush had been getting calls from people overseas saying they had received emails from News Corp’s inhouse counsel Michael Cameron.

“It seems Mr Cameron is trying to dig up dirt on Mr Rush amongst his former colleagues and people he has worked with in the United States,” she said in Sydney.

Rush was finding it “very upsetting” to receive these communications two or three weeks out from the trial, which is due to begin on 22 October.

Chrysanthou sought correspondence relating to Cameron’s investigation but the Telegraph’s lawyer, Lyndelle Barnett, said the time frame – dating back to November 2017 – was extremely broad.

To suggest any inhouse counsel wasn’t entitled to make inquiries to defend a case was “ludicrous”, she said.

Denying Cameron’s sole purpose for the trip had been the investigation, Barnett said he had been on a personal holiday.

“I’m reluctant to tender evidence of him scuba-diving on Facebook,” she said.

Chrysanthou read out an email she said Cameron sent to a person, which stated: “I am currently visiting the United States to investigate ....”.

“It doesn’t sound like my idea of a holiday,” she told Justice Michael Wigney.

He was sending unsolicited emails to people he didn’t know, trying to investigate something which had nothing to do with the lawsuit in order to dig up dirt on the actor, she said.

The judge said Cameron could make any investigation he wanted to make – “he’s a lawyer”.

He suggested the time frame be limited and the parties agreed the emails would be provided from a few days before he left for his September trip.