The lies that got Erin Patterson sacked from her air traffic control job as ANOTHER tainted food claim emerges... and the insulting three-word nickname colleagues gave the 'weird' triple murderer

Daily Mail​

6 days ago

Erin Patterson was branded 'crazy' by colleagues before being fired from her job as an air traffic controller for lying about her working hours.
Patterson, 50, was found guilty on three counts of murder and one of attempted murder on Monday after serving her in-laws beef Wellingtons poisoned with death cap mushrooms at her Leongatha home on July 29, 2023.
In her late 20's, she had worked at Airservices Australia and trained with traffic control course number four in Melbourne between February and November 2001.
The murderer, whose maiden name was Scutter before marrying Simon Patterson in 2007, was secretly nicknamed 'Scutter the Nutter' among her training group.
'Something was not quite right, she was a bit strange,' a coursemate who asked not to be named told The Herald Sun.
The source described Patterson as 'super secretive' about her life, claimed she was also dubbed 'crazy Erin' by her peers and that 'she would say some weird off-the-cuff things … she wasn't a nice person, she just wasn't someone you connected to'.
Another colleague, who had managed Patterson, said she was counselled about her disheveled appearance and that there had been concerns raised by a different workmate that she had placed a blade from a pencil sharpener in a banana.
'Again, no one could prove that, but she had a way about her that was off-putting,' the colleague told The Australian.
Patterson worked in the Southern Flight Information Region, based in Melbourne, from February 12, 2001, until November 28, 2002.
She was fired after Airservices Australia management began to suspect she was leaving work early while claiming the time.
CCTV from the car park confirmed management's suspicions, but Patterson lied until she was showed the incriminating footage.
The former colleague described Patterson as 'manipulative', 'aggressive' and branded her a 'pathological liar'.
It's understood Patterson 'wrapped [men] around her little finger' and had been pursued by several staff members.
Not long after Patterson left the job in 2002, she was slapped with a long-term licence ban after driving drunk and fleeing the scene of a car crash.
On Monday, a jury found Patterson guilty to Ian Wilkinson's attempted murder, then his wife Heather's murder, followed by the murders of Gail and Don Patterson.
The 50-year-old mother served death cap mushroom-laced beef Wellington parcels to her estranged in-laws.
Within hours of the verdict, the Supreme Court released dozens of pieces of evidence that helped prosecutors secure the conviction.
This included photos showing remnants of beef Wellington leftovers as they were tested by toxicologists, after police found them inside a bin at Patterson's home.
A video of Patterson discharging herself from Leongatha Hospital, minutes after she had arrived, was also released and showed her speaking to hospital staff at the entrance.
Images of Patterson at Leongatha Hospital, after she took herself there, revealed a pink phone police say they never recovered.
Prosecutors said this was Patterson's primary phone in 2023 and claimed she had used it to find death cap mushrooms online.
Photos of yellow mushrooms on scales were released, along with footage of Patterson getting rid of a food dehydrator at Koonwarra tip.
The Sunbeam dehydrator, which she bought three months before the lunch, was found to contain death cap mushroom toxins.
The jury's guilty verdicts came seven days after they had been sent away to deliberate and 11 weeks into the trial in Morwell, regional Victoria.
Patterson faces a sentence of life in prison for the three murders and one attempted murder.
The families of the murder victims, who died in hospital days after eating lunch at Patterson's home, were absent for the verdicts, as was sole lunch survivor Ian Wilkinson.
Homicide Squad Detective Dean Thomas said the families had asked for privacy.
'It's very important that we remember ... that three people have died and we've had a person that nearly died and was seriously injured as a result and that has led to these charges,' he said outside court.
'I ask that we acknowledge those people and not forget them.'