Mushroom cook asked 'who died?' as police searched her home, court hears
Your web browser is no longer supported. To improve your experience update it here A police search of Erin Patterson's home one week after serving up a toxic dish to her estranged husband's family has been shown to her triple-murder trial. The jury was told mushroom cook Erin Patterson asked police "who died?" when they arrived to search her home one week after serving up a poisonous meal to her estranged husband's family. The 50-year-old is nearing the end of her triple-murder trial in regional Victoria, over the July 2023 toxic beef Wellington lunch she prepared which led to the deaths of three people, and near death of another. The jury was told Mushroom cook Erin Patterson asked police "who died?" when they arrived to search her home one week after serving up a poisonous meal to her estranged husband's family. (Paul Tyquin) Patterson is defending the charges and maintains the deaths were a tragic accident. Video from a police search seven days after the meal was shown to the jury today as a detective gave evidence. Detective Sergeant Luke Farrell said he arrived at Patterson's home in Leongatha, two hours' drive south-east of Melbourne, about 11.30am on August 5. The jury was shown photos of dark-coloured, red-coloured and a multi-coloured plate in drawers and a dishwasher at the home, as well as Nagi Maehashi's RecipeTin Eats cookbook titled Dinner next to the stove. Farrell said he opened the cookbook and found a beef Wellington recipe on a page that was "spattered" with cooking liquids. Photos of digital scales, a Sunbeam dehydrator manual, computer hard drives and tablets found in the home were also shown to the jury. He said the search concluded about 3.45pm that day but before leaving he sat down with Patterson and asked for her phone. A video of that interaction was played to the jury, where Farrell sits opposite Patterson at her dining table. "Thanks for your patience today, with the house search," he says to Patterson. He said there was only one outstanding item, her mobile phone, and asked to "have a look". Patterson replied "of course", handed her phone over and he then asked if a pin code was required. She replied it was either a four-digit code or a six-digit code, but could not remember "which one", and then leaned over the table to assist him with the phone. Under cross-examination by defence barrister Colin Mandy SC, the detective confirmed Patterson's two children and dog were home during the search. She "expressed surprise" at being told Heather Wilkinson had died when police arrived, he said. The detective was read transcript of a video from that day, which stated Patterson was told the search warrant was "in connection to the deaths of two people over the last couple of days". "Her response is 'who died?'" Mandy asked Farrell, to which he agreed. Earlier today, a public health adviser was cross-examined by defence over alleged changes to the information Patterson had given her during a search of Asian stores for deadly mushrooms. Patterson had told Victorian Department of Health senior adviser Sally Ann Atkinson she'd purchased dried mushrooms from a store in Oakleigh, Clayton or Mount Waverley in April 2023 for a pasta dish. The jury heard Atkinson claim Patterson had changed her story, initially stating she had used some of the mushrooms in that dish, and later said she decided not to use them. "At that time it sounded like she'd given me two conflicting pieces of information," she said today. Atkinson said she was involved in public health efforts to track down mushrooms from July 31 to August 4, and said Patterson informed her on August 3 to also look at Asian stores in Glen Waverley. After the investigation, which formally concluded on August 11, a report was compiled titled "The Patterson Family Outbreak", the jury was told. Atkinson confirmed the health department found the poisoning was an "isolated incident" and the risk to public health was "very low" with no recalls of products warranted. It was "highly unlikely" the commercial supply chain of mushrooms had been contaminated with amatoxin, also known as death cap mushrooms, she said. Patterson has pleaded not guilty to three counts of murder, over Don and Gail Patterson and Wilkinson's deaths, and one of attempted murder. The trial before Justice Christopher Beale continues. LISTEN NOW: The Mushroom Trial: Say Grace is the latest podcast from Nine and The Age . Join journalists Penelope Liersch and Erin Pearson as they take listeners inside the case that's grabbed global headlines. You can listen on Apple here and Spotify here. courts
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Perth Now
2 hours ago
- Perth Now
Mushroom cook Erin Patterson breaks her silence
Almost two years after four of her husband's family members fell deathly ill following a lunch she hosted, alleged poisoner Erin Patterson has broken her silence. For eight days, the 50-year-old sat in the witness box of a regional Victorian courtroom as she answered thousands of questions about her life, her relationships and the events surrounding July 29, 2023. Her evidence was, at times, intensely personal as the alleged triple-murderer spoke about issues in her marriage, feeling ostracised from her husband's family, lies she told and an eating disorder no one knew about. And it all played out in front of a jury of her peers, her in-laws and a packed public gallery – some lining up for hours in near-zero temperatures to ensure a seat in the second-floor courtroom. Erin Patterson has finished her marathon session giving evidence in her triple-murder trial. (James Ross/AAP PHOTOS) Credit: AAP This Thursday, on day 31 of the trial, senior Crown prosecutor Nanette Rogers SC closed off five days of cross-examination with three questions that lie at the heart of the Crown's case. 'I suggest that you deliberately sourced death cap mushrooms in 2023; agree or disagree?' Dr Rogers asked. 'Disagree.' 'I suggest you deliberately included them in the beef Wellingtons you served to Don Patterson, Gail Patterson, Ian Wilkinson and Heather Wilkinson; agree or disagree?' 'Disagree.' 'And you did so intending to kill them; agree or disagree?' 'Disagree.' Ms Patterson has pleaded not guilty to three counts of murder and one count of attempted murder with her defence arguing she did not intentionally poison anyone and the case is a tragic accident. Her estranged husband Simon Patterson's parents, Don and Gail Patterson, and his aunt, Heather Wilkinson died from death cap mushroom poisoning in the week after eating a beef wellington lunch she hosted. The fourth guest, Heather's husband Korumburra Baptist Church pastor Ian Wilkinson, recovered and has been a regular face in the Morwell courtroom alongside other members of the Wilkinson and Patterson families. Korumburra pastor Ian Wilkinson and wife Heather Wilkinson also ate the beef wellington. Supplied. Credit: Supplied On the stand, Ms Patterson denied wanting to harm any of her four guests and said the July 29 lunch was spurred by a desire to close some distance she had felt in recent months. She told the jury after her separation from Simon in 2015, Don and Gail had remained central figures in her life, particularly after the deaths of her own parents. But she felt Simon had a hand in ostracising her from his family and had decided to be more proactive 'so I didn't lose that connection'. She said Simon and her had struggled to communicate over the entirety of their relationship but remained close after their split until a child support dispute in late 2022 created tension. 'We didn't relate on friend things, banter, like we used to. That changed at the start of the year,' she said. Ms Patterson's estranged husband Simon Patterson. NewsWire / David Geraghty Credit: News Corp Australia Ms Patterson told the jury she chose to make beef wellington for the lunch because it was a dish her mother would make for special occasions, modifying Nagi Maehashi's recipe from a log to individual portions because she could only find eye-fillet steaks. She said she primarily used button mushrooms from Woolworths to make the duxelles, or mushroom paste, but added dried mushrooms from her pantry because the dish 'seemed a little bland'. She gave evidence the dried mushrooms were purchased from an Asian grocer in Melbourne's east in about April the same year and had a 'pungent smell'. 'I thought it was the perfect dish for them,' the accused woman said. Ms Patterson said she made six beef wellingtons, serving five to herself and her guests, and serving the last one to her children for dinner the following night with the pastry and mushrooms scrapped off. She said in the aftermath of the lunch she believed she only used mushrooms from the two sources but now accepts she 'may' have added dehydrated wild mushrooms to the Tupperware container in her pantry. The jury heard Ms Patterson bought a dehydrator on April 28, 2023. She told the court she bought the Sunbeam device so she could preserve foods including wild mushrooms and denied a suggestion by prosecutors that the purchase was made two hours after picking death cap mushrooms in the nearby town of Loch. She further disputed Dr Roger's suggestion that a photo located in the Google Photos cache data on a Samsung tablet depicts death caps on a dehydrator tray with the last modified date of May 4. Erin Patterson is facing trial accused of murdering three of her husband's family members. NewsWire / Paul Tyquin Credit: News Corp Australia In her recorded interview with police a week after the lunch, Ms Patterson said she'd never foraged for mushrooms. On the stand however, she admitted this was a lie, telling the jury she developed an interest in wild mushrooms during the early 2020 Covid lockdowns. Over a period of months she said she grew confident in identifying field and horse mushrooms in the paddocks on her property, before 'eventually' eating them. 'I cut a bit off one of the mushrooms, fried it up with some butter, ate it, and then saw what happened,' she said. 'They tasted good and I didn't get sick.' Ms Patterson said over the following years she would go foraging in nearby areas and cook the wild mushrooms into meals for her and her children. But she said she'd never foraged at two locations, Loch and Outtrim, where prosecutors allege phone records indicate a possible visit after death cap sightings were posted on iNaturalist. In cross-examination, she refuted a suggestion by Dr Rogers that her interest in mushrooms was invented 'to try and explain why you put foraged death cap mushrooms in the meal'. In her evidence, the accused woman disputed several aspects of lunch survivor Ian Wilkinson's account to the jury of the event. He described the four lunch guests eating off large grey plates while Ms Patterson ate off a smaller 'orangey-tan' plate and her sharing an ovarian cancer diagnosis and asking for advice on how to tell the children. Ms Patterson said she did not own grey plates, nor an orangey-tan one or even four plates of a set. The jury was shown images taken from the police walk-through on August 5 which show two white plates, two black plates, a black and red plate and a multi-coloured plate. Ms Patterson confirmed these were the only plates she owned. A supplied image obtained on Saturday, August 12, 2023, of Don Patterson and Gail Patterson who died in hospital after eating a meal suspected to have contained poisoned mushroom. Homicide squad detectives are continuing to investigate how four guests became seriously ill after attending a lunch at a Leongatha home in Victoria's southeast on July 29. (AAP Image/Supplied by IntraWork Business Services) NO ARCHIVING, EDITORIAL USE ONLY Credit: SUPPLIED / PR IMAGE She also disputed that she told the guests she had cancer, claiming she said she might have some 'upcoming treatment' after telling Don and Gail she was receiving testing on a lump on her elbow earlier that year. Ms Patterson admitted she lied to Don and Gail about undergoing a needle biopsy and MRI but said she was planning on using the lump, which has resolved itself, as cover for weight-loss surgery. 'I'd been fighting a never-ending battle of low self-esteem most of my adult life, and the further inroads I made into being middle aged, the less I felt good about myself, I suppose,' she said. 'I was ashamed of the fact that I didn't have control over my body or what I ate … I shouldn't have lied to them.' Ms Patterson told the court she'd never had a 'healthy relationship' with food and had been bingeing and purging since her 20s – something she hid from everyone around her. 'In some intense periods it could have been daily, then it could be weekly or monthly,' she said. She said at the lunch she only ate a portion of her beef wellington but after her guests left, she cleaned up and binged on an orange cake Gail had brought. 'I had a piece of cake and then another piece of cake and then another,' she said, her voice faltering. The alleged poisoner said she felt sick and 'brought it back up' some time that afternoon, but would not be drawn on if she vomited the beef wellington. 'I couldn't be sure what was in my vomit,' she said. Ms Patterson disputed a suggestion by Dr Rogers that her account of vomiting was a lie to account for why she didn't fall seriously ill like her guests. 'I wish that was true, but it's not,' she said. Ms Patterson said she had a pre-assessment scheduled for gastric bypass surgery at the ENRICH Clinic in Melbourne two months after the lunch but cancelled it in the fallout. In a last-minute statement produced by prosecutors on June 11, ENRICH Clinic testified they'd never offered gastric bypass surgery. Ms Patterson refused to concede she lied, saying that was her memory but perhaps it was another weight loss procedure, such as liposuction. Her barrister Colin Mandy SC later produced a screenshot of the ENRICH Clinic's website, which contained a post saying they stopped offering liposuction in June 2024. After Ms Patterson's evidence concluded on Thursday, jurors were told by Justice Christopher Beale that marked the 'completion of the evidence in this case'. The trial is expected to resume on Monday as prosecutors deliver their closing address before the defence follows suit. The trial continues.
ABC News
6 hours ago
- ABC News
The moments from Erin Patterson's evidence that didn't make headlines
In a courtroom cross-examination, the questions largely flow one way. A lawyer for the defence or prosecution gets the chance to ask questions of the other side's witness, to test the evidence they have given to the court. It was a principle crown prosecutor Nanette Rogers SC was quick to highlight to accused killer Erin Patterson this week, as they locked horns over evidence drawn from a computer in Ms Patterson's home. Dr Rogers had put to Ms Patterson that she'd used her computer in May 2022 to visit iNaturalist website pages containing information about death cap mushrooms. The court was shown a log of individual URL visits prosecutors said were made on Ms Patterson's PC over a period of time. Dr Rogers's questioning turned to the "visit count" recorded in the log for one particular URL. Dr Rogers: You had visited this URL once before on this device, correct? Ms Patterson: Yes, correct, and I believe it was two seconds earlier. Dr Rogers: I suggest you're wrong about that; correct or incorrect? Ms Patterson: Ah, I'm correct. A short time later, the prosecutor indicated she would move on from the exhibit of URLs visited by the PC. Dr Rogers: Now I'm moving on to a different topic. Ms Patterson: Before you do, Dr Rogers, within this record is that second [website] visit … that I was talking about, 7:23:16, 7:23:18. Dr Rogers: Ms Patterson, I am the person who asks the questions. If there's something that needs to be clarified in re-examination, then your barrister will do so. Ms Patterson: No problem. In her evidence, Ms Patterson also told Dr Rogers she did not recall if it was her who was operating the computer when it visited the page. "Somebody did, and that somebody could have been me," she told the prosecutor. The exchange was not the only one where Ms Patterson pointed out details she believed to be incorrect. One example was when she was given a date in 2023 with the incorrect day of the week: Dr Rogers: [Mobile phone tower expert Matthew Sorrell's] evidence was: "On Monday, 28th of April 2023, the mobile service records for you indicate a possible visit to the Loch township." Ms Patterson: I'm really sorry, Dr Rogers, could you just repeat the date? ... I just lost focus. Dr Rogers: On Monday, 28 April … his evidence was: "The mobile service records for you indicate a possible visit to the Loch township." Ms Patterson: I don't mean to be argumentative, but I think the 28th of April was a Friday. The only reason I remember that, is [my daughter] had two ballets on the 29th and 30th of April and they were that weekend. Dr Rogers: Ok, I'll change it Ms Patterson: Ok. It was an exchange Dr Rogers did not forget, referencing it later that day as she sought to inject a moment of levity into the hours-long examination. Dr Rogers: I better check with you. Monday, 22 May, it's a Monday? Ms Patterson: I don't know about that one. Dr Rogers: It's a joke. It's a joke. I take out the 'Monday'. Throughout her cross-examination, Ms Patterson was focused on Dr Rogers, blinking rapidly and speaking with a level voice as she rejected the suggestion her actions after the lunch were those of a guilty woman covering her tracks. She repeatedly denied to the Supreme Court jury that she was guilty of the murder of three in-laws and the attempted murder of a fourth. She rotated through outfits which have been widely described in media reports and sketches: a paisley-coloured top, a dark-coloured top with white polka dots and a pink shirt. The 50-year-old kept her glasses in her hands during her hours on the stand, so they were ready if she was taken to one of the many trial exhibits on the computer monitor before her. Her questioner, Dr Rogers, kept a brisk pace as she sought to make the most of the opportunity to ask questions of the accused. At times, responses became more personal as Dr Rogers suggested the evidence of Ms Patterson strained credibility. When questioning turned to the Monday after the Saturday lunch, Ms Patterson was asked about her movements after she discharged herself from Leongatha Hospital against medical advice. The court heard she arrived about 8am that day but left about 10 minutes later, before returning after a roughly 90-minute absence. Ms Patterson told the jury she had needed that time to see to things like putting the lambs away to protect them from foxes and packing her daughter's ballet bag, before she could be admitted to hospital for full treatment. She told the court this week that after returning home she also laid down "for a while". Dr Rogers: How long did you lie down for? Ms Patterson: I don't know. Dr Rogers: That's untrue, isn't it? … It's untrue that you lay down? Ms Patterson: No. Dr Rogers: Surely that's the last thing you would do in these circumstances? Ms Patterson: It might be the last thing you'd do, but it was something I did. Dr Rogers: After you'd been told by medical staff that you had potentially ingested a life-threatening poison, isn't it the last thing that you would do, is to lie down in those circumstances? Ms Patterson: They didn't tell me it was life-threatening. By any measure, Ms Patterson's time in the witness box was a lengthy one, stretching over eight days of hearings. And in a case where the complex brief of evidence has ranged from computer and mobile phone data to the science of differentiating fungi, moments have often been needed by all of the parties conducting the trial to double-check the facts on record. But by the end of the week, the time for questioning Ms Patterson was over, and the evidence phase of the trial drew to a close. Now the prosecution and defence will trawl through the hours of transcripts and reams of documents as they prepare to deliver their final arguments in one of Australia's most closely watched trials in years.
The Age
8 hours ago
- The Age
A garden tour, small talk and an illness confession. The mushroom lunch according to Erin Patterson
Ian Wilkinson told the jury he was in the main body of the church when his wife told him they'd been invited for a meal at Erin Patterson's. 'She was fairly excited,' the pastor recalled. 'We were very happy to be invited. Seemed like maybe our relationship with Erin was going to improve.' Wilkinson said there was no reason given for the lunch and that he wondered aloud to his wife about why suddenly, they were invited. Erin Patterson says she extended the invitation to Simon despite a relationship they both agreed had become less friendly and more formal. By this time, she says, she'd long held an interest in foraging for mushrooms, borne out of pandemic lockdown walks with her children. Years later, Patterson told the jury she bought a dehydrator in April 2023 from the local electrical store as she was eager to learn how to dehydrate wild and store-bought mushrooms to ensure she could eat them, and other foods, year round. It became somewhat of an experiment, she told the Morwell jury, working out how to best dehydrate the fungi, and she said she would later eat them or blend them into a powder to hide in her children's food for added nutrition. It was during this time, she said, that she shared details of her life with a group of Facebook friends, who spoke regularly about everything from recipes to their children, politics and world events. Their conversations were frequent, and the court heard 600 pages of messages were obtained from early to mid-December 2022 alone. In them, Patterson spoke about issues with her separation from Simon, described him as a 'deadbeat' father and complained that her attempts to get her in-laws to intervene were falling on deaf ears. 'This family I swear to f---ing god,' one post read. 'Nobody bloody listens to me, at least I know they're a lost cause,' another read. 'I'm sick of this shit I want nothing to do with them,' a third post read. 'F--- them.' Patterson, the court heard, later told police she loved and had a great relationship with Don and Gail Patterson. 'They got on very well I think,' Simon told the jury. 'She especially got along well with Dad. They shared a love of knowledge and learning and an interest in the world, and I think she loved his gentle nature.' Erin Patterson said by the time she organised the lunch she feared Simon was creating distance between her and his parents. 'They did love me and I did love them,' she said. 'I had felt for some months my relationship with the wider Patterson family, particularly Don and Gail, had a bit more distance and space put between us.' In the days before the lunch, Erin Patterson says she wanted to cook her guests something special, better than the shepherd's pie she'd last served the Pattersons. She said she remembered her mother cooking beef Wellington and used the RecipeTin Eats cookbook to help guide her preparation. Shopping receipts show Erin Patterson made repeat trips to the supermarket to buy pastry, mushrooms and steak. The night before the meal, Simon Patterson sent her a text message and the former couple had a terse exchange. 'I feel too uncomfortable about coming to the lunch with you, Mum, Dad, Heather and Ian tomorrow, but I'm happy to talk about your health and implications of that at another time. If you'd like to discuss on the phone, just let me know,' Simon texted. Erin replied: 'That's really disappointing. I've spent many hours this week preparing lunch for tomorrow, which has been exhausting in light of the issues I'm facing, and spent a small fortune on beef eye fillet to make beef Wellingtons because I wanted it to be a special meal, as I may not be able to host a lunch like this again for some time. It's important to me that you're all there tomorrow, and that I can have the conversations that I need to have. I hope you'll change your mind. Your parents, and Heather and Ian are coming at 12.30. I hope to see you there.' Erin Patterson told the jury she'd been unable to buy a single large piece of steak so decided instead to make individual parcels of beef Wellington for each guest, six in total. She began preparing the meal by making a mushroom duxelle, or paste, using the mushrooms she bought from Woolworths. But when she tasted it, she was worried it was too bland. She says she grabbed a Tupperware container she believed contained 'pungent' dried mushrooms she bought three months earlier from an unidentified Asian grocery store in the City of Monash area of Melbourne. As her guests' arrival drew nearer, Erin Patterson says she dropped her children and their friend off in town to eat McDonald's and watch a movie. When the Wilkinsons and her in-laws arrived, Gail carrying an orange cake and Heather a fruit platter, the group toured her garden and the women Erin Patterson's new pantry. They then gathered in the open-plan kitchen and dining area where the host plated up mashed potatoes, green beans and individual beef Wellingtons about 12.30pm. Erin Patterson told the jury that when she turned her back on the group to heat pre-made gravy satchels, the women began carrying the plates to the table. One, Erin Patterson says, remained on the kitchen bench and that's the one she took to eat from. The accused says the group chatted as they ate, and she talked so much she ended up eating little of her meal. She says they spoke about politics and current affairs before she led them to believe she had an illness, but never used the word 'cancer'. Her guests left in time for Ian Wilkinson to attend a 3pm appointment. Erin was left home on her own until Simon picked the children up from their movie and dropped them home. The following morning, the accused says, she learnt from her estranged husband that his parents were unwell. She says she too was suffering from diarrhoea but took imodium so she could take her son to a flying lesson. The trip was interrupted, she says, when she had to stop to defecate on the side of the road, and she cleaned herself and placed tissues in a doggy bag until she could dispose of them in a bathroom toilet at the Caldermeade BP service station. Loading Patterson says that on the Sunday evening – July 30, 2023 – she scraped the mushroom paste and pastry off the leftovers and fed her two children what remained. She says as her diarrhoea worsened, she felt too unwell to eat the dinner and instead unsuccessfully attempted to eat cereal. In the following days, she says, she took herself to hospital for what she believed was gastro, and left at one point to take care of her animals and children, before returning to be admitted and transferred to a Melbourne hospital for investigation of possible death cap mushroom poisoning. She says that while in hospital, Simon said to her, 'Is that how you poisoned my parents, using that dehydrator?' She denied the allegation. The jury heard that sent her into panic as it dawned on her that there may have also been foraged mushrooms in the Tupperware container. She returned home, grabbed the dehydrator and dumped it at the local tip. The mother of two says she later factory reset her mobile phone because she did not want police to find the images she had of her drying mushrooms, and lied to police about ever foraging. She denies ever deliberately poisoning anyone, or deliberately lying to police to cover her tracks. That is how Patterson says she came to be wrongly accused of murdering Don and Gail Patterson and Heather Wilkinson, and attempting to murder Ian Wilkinson. Prosecutors spent five days cross-examining her about her version of events as evidence in the seven-week-long trial drew to a close. They claim the accused saw online posts about death cap mushrooms located in her area, and that mobile phone tracking shows she travelled to the sites, including Loch and Outtrim, to purposely pick death caps. Crown prosecutor Nanette Rogers, SC, told the jury Patterson's version of events are a lie and that she lured the lunch guests to her home with a fake cancer diagnosis and fed them the death caps. And, prosecutors allege, if Simon Patterson had attended lunch, his estranged wife would have also fed him a poisoned pastry parcel. The prosecution alleges that in the aftermath of the fatal lunch, the accused took steps to conceal her involvement, was never unwell and lied to police in her record of interview. 'I suggest that you deliberately sourced death cap mushrooms in 2023. I suggest you deliberately included them in the beef Wellington you served to [your four guests]. You did so intending to kill them,' Rogers asked the accused this week. 'Disagree,' Erin Patterson replied three times, after each accusation.
