Woman who denies mushroom murders of her in-laws accepts that she served them death caps for lunch
WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — An Australian woman accused of murdering three of her estranged husband's relatives with poisonous mushrooms told a court on Tuesday she accepted that the fatal lunch she served contained death caps.
But Erin Patterson said the 'vast majority' of the fungi came from local stores. She denies three counts of murder and one of attempted murder over the beef Wellington meal she served to her parents-in-law and her estranged husband's aunt and uncle at her home in July 2023.
Don Patterson, Gail Patterson and Heather Wilkinson were hospitalized and died after the lunch in the rural town of Leongatha in the Australian state of Victoria. Heather's husband, Ian Wilkinson, was gravely ill but survived.
Patterson's lawyer earlier told the Supreme Court trial that the poisoning was a tragic accident but prosecutors said it was deliberate. If convicted, she faces a sentence of life imprisonment on the murder charges and 25 years in jail for attempted murder.
Long queues formed outside the Latrobe Valley Courthouse on Tuesday after Patterson took the stand late Monday, which was the first time she had spoken publicly since the deaths.
Accused foraged mushrooms for years
During several hours of evidence on Tuesday, Patterson, 50, told the court she began foraging fungi during the COVID-19 lockdown of March 2020, witnessed only by her children.
'I cut a bit of one of the mushrooms, fried it up with some butter and ate it,' she said. 'They tasted good and I didn't get sick.'
Patterson said she also fed foraged mushrooms to her children, chopped up 'very, very small' so they couldn't pick them out of curries, pasta and soups.
She developed a taste for exotic varieties, joined a 'mushroom lovers' Facebook group, and bought a dehydrator to preserve her finds, Patterson said. Her lawyer, Colin Mandy SC, asked if she accepted that the beef Wellington pastries she had served to her lunch guests in 2023 contained death caps.
'Yes, I do,' said Patterson.
The accused told her lawyer most of the mushrooms she used that day came from local supermarkets. She agreed she might have put them in the same container as dehydrated wild mushrooms she had foraged weeks earlier and others from an Asian food store.
Mandy in April told the court his client had lied when she initially told investigators that she had never foraged before. But he denied that she had deliberately sought out death cap mushrooms and said she disposed of her dehydrator in a panic about the accidental deaths.
Regrets over 'venting' messages about in-laws
Earlier Tuesday, Patterson became tearful when she was asked about expletive-filled messages she had sent about her in-laws in December 2022 in a Facebook group chat that she described as a 'safe venting space' for a group of women.
'I wish I'd never said it. I feel very ashamed for saying it and I wish that the family didn't have to hear that I said it,' said Patterson. 'They didn't deserve it.'
Patterson, who said she had tried to have her parents-in-law mediate a dispute with her estranged husband, Simon, about school fees, said she was feeling hurt, frustrated and 'a little bit desperate.'
The couple formally separated in 2015 after earlier temporary splits, the court has heard. Simon Patterson was invited to the July 2023 lunch but did not attend.
Accused said she was still close with husband's family
Tuesday's evidence also traversed Patterson's health after prosecutors' suggestions that her lunch invitation was unusual and that she'd organized it on a false pretense of receiving a cancer diagnosis. The mother of two admitted she never had cancer, but had been worried enough by symptoms to seek tests.
Despite her separation from Simon, Patterson said she had hoped to reunite with her estranged husband and said she had remained close to her in-laws.
'It never changed. I was just their daughter in law,' said Patterson, through tears. 'They just continued to love me.'
Evidence follows lengthy prosecution case
The 14-member jury has heard five weeks of prosecution evidence, including what the lunch guests told relatives before they died. Heather Wilkinson said shortly before she died that Patterson ate her individual beef wellington pastry from a different colored plate to the other diners, said prosecutor Nanette Rogers.
Opening her case in April, Rogers said the poisoning was deliberate but that her case would not suggest a motive for the alleged killings. The prosecution says Patterson lied when she told investigators she had eaten the same meal as her guests and fed her children the leftovers.
Patterson is due to continue giving evidence on Wednesday. Her evidence Tuesday did not include her account of the day of the lunch, or cross-examination from prosecutors.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Winnipeg Free Press
18 minutes ago
- Winnipeg Free Press
India is preparing to launch its delayed census, including controversial questions about caste
NEW DELHI (AP) — India will start counting its vast population in a mammoth exercise starting next year. The first census in 16 years will be conducted digitally and include controversial questions about caste for the first time since independence. The Home Ministry announced plans to conduct a two-stage count ending March 1, 2027 in a statement Wednesday night. India's last official census in 2011 counted 1.21 billion people. The country's population is now estimated to be well over 1.4 billion, making it the world's most populous country, according to the U.N.'s Department of Economic and Social Affairs. The once-in-a-decade population survey was originally due in 2021 but was delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic and logistical hurdles. Here's a look at what goes into India's census and why it matters. The census shapes welfare policies and representation The official count of the country's people is used to allocate many of India's welfare programs and other policies. It could also pave the way for redrawing the political landscape of India as seats are added to the lower house of Parliament and state legislatures to represent a larger population. Under the 2023 Women's Reservation Bill, a third of those seats will be set aside for women. A massive count The Indian census is said to be the largest peacetime mobilization in the world. Almost 2.7 million people were hired to implement the 2011 census, visiting more than 240 million households. The Home Ministry said the new census will be carried out in two phases and conclude by March 1, 2027. The government will spell out the details and schedule of the exercise later this month. They'll collect information about houses and their occupants, such as sex, age, marital status, religion, mother tongue, language, literacy and economic activity — as well as caste. New questions about caste are controversial The next census will be the first to consider the caste status of most Indians. Caste is an ancient system of social hierarchy in India and is critical to Indian life and politics. There are hundreds of caste groups based on occupation and economic status across India, particularly among Hindus, but the country has limited, or outdated data on how many people belong to them. Since independent India's first census in 1951, it counted only Dalits and Adivasis, members of marginalized groups known as scheduled castes and tribes. But India also has quotas that reserve government jobs, college admissions and elected offices for a swathe of lower and intermediate castes that are recognized as Other Backward Classes. India's current policy caps quotas at 50%, with 27% reserved for OBCs. A count of these groups will likely lead to calls to raise the quotas. Successive Indian governments have resisted updating caste data, arguing that it could lead to social unrest. The announcement on the census comes months ahead of a crucial election in India's poorest state of Bihar, where caste is a key issue. Prime Minister Narendra Modi's party runs a coalition government in Bihar.
Winnipeg Free Press
18 minutes ago
- Winnipeg Free Press
California's Yurok Tribe gets back ancestral lands that were taken over 120 years ago
ON THE KLAMATH RIVER, Calif. (AP) — As a youngster, Barry McCovey Jr. would sneak through metal gates and hide from security guards just to catch a steelhead trout in Blue Creek amid northwestern California redwoods. Since time immemorial, his ancestors from the Yurok Tribe had fished, hunted and gathered in this watershed flanked by coastal forests. But for more than 100 years, these lands were owned and managed by timber companies, severing the tribe's access to its homelands. When McCovey started working as a fisheries technician, the company would let him go there to do his job. 'Snorkeling Blue Creek … I felt the significance of that place to myself and to our people, and I knew then that we had to do whatever we could to try and get that back,' McCovey said. After a 23-year effort and $56 million, that became reality. Roughly 73 square miles (189 square kilometers) of homelands have been returned to the Yurok, more than doubling the tribe's land holdings, according to a deal announced Thursday. Completion of the land-back conservation deal along the lower Klamath River — a partnership with Western Rivers Conservancy and other environmental groups — is being called the largest in California history. The Yurok Tribe had 90% of its territory taken during the California Gold Rush in the mid-1800s, suffering massacres and disease from settlers. 'To go from when I was a kid and 20 years ago even, from being afraid to go out there to having it be back in tribal hands … is incredible,' said McCovey, director of the Yurok Tribal Fisheries Department. ___ EDITOR'S NOTE: This is part of a series of on how tribes and Indigenous communities are coping with and combating climate change. ___ Land Back is a global movement seeking the return of homelands to Indigenous people through ownership or co-stewardship. In the last decade, nearly 4,700 square miles (12,173 square kilometers) were returned to tribes in 15 states through a federal program. Organizations are aiding similar efforts. There's mounting recognition that Indigenous people's traditional knowledge is critical to addressing climate change. Studies found the healthiest, most biodiverse and resilient forests are on protected native lands where Indigenous people remained stewards. Beth Rose Middleton Manning, a University of California, Davis professor of Native American Studies, said Indigenous people's perspective — living in relation with the lands, waterways and wildlife — is becoming widely recognized, and is a stark contrast to Western views. 'Management of a forest to grow conifers for sale is very different from thinking about the ecosystem and the different plants and animals and people as part of it and how we all play a role,' she said. The Yurok people will now manage these lands and waterways. The tribe's plans include reintroducing fire as a forest management tool, clearing lands for prairie restoration, removing invasive species and planting trees while providing work for some of the tribe's more than 5,000 members and helping restore salmon and wildlife. Protecting a salmon sanctuary One fall morning in heavy fog, a motorboat roared down the turbid Klamath toward Blue Creek — the crown jewel of these lands — past towering redwoods, and cottonwoods, willows, alders. Suddenly, gray gave way to blue sky, where an osprey and bald eagle soared. Along a bank, a black bear scrambled over rocks. The place is home to imperiled marbled murrelets, northern spotted owls and Humboldt martens, as well as elk, deer and mountain lions. The Klamath River basin supports fish — steelhead, coho and Chinook salmon — that live in both fresh and saltwater. The Klamath was once the West Coast's third largest salmon-producing river and the life force of Indigenous people. But the state's salmon stock has plummeted so dramatically — in part from dams and diversions — that fishing was banned for the third consecutive year. 'We can't have commercial fishing because populations are so low,' said Tiana Williams-Claussen, director of the Yurok Tribe Wildlife Department. 'Our people would use the revenue to feed their families; now there's less than one salmon per Yurok Tribe member.' Experts say restoring Blue Creek complements the successful, decades-long fight by tribes to remove the Klamath dams — the largest dam removal in U.S. history. This watershed is a cold-water lifeline in the lower Klamath for spawning salmon and steelhead that stop to cool down before swimming upstream. That's key amid climate-infused droughts and warming waters. 'For the major river to have its most critical and cold-water tributary … just doing its job is critical to the entire ecosystem,' said Sue Doroff, co-founder and former president of Western Rivers Conservancy. Altered lands, waterways For more than 100 years, these lands were owned and managed for industrial timber. Patchworks of 15 to 20 acres (6.07 to 8.09 hectares) at a time of redwoods and Douglas firs have been clear cut to produce and sell logs domestically, according to Galen Schuler, a vice president at Green Diamond Resource Company, the previous land owner. Schuler said the forests have been sustainably managed, with no more than 2% cut annually, and that old growth is spared. He said they are 'maybe on the third round' of clear cutting since the 1850s. But clear cutting creates sediment that winds up in streams, making them shallower, more prone to warming and worsening water quality, according to Josh Kling, conservation director for the conservancy. Sediment, including from roads, can also smother salmon eggs and kill small fish. Culverts, common on Western logging roads, have also been an issue here. Most 'were undersized relative to what a fish needs for passage,' Kling said. Land management decisions for commercial timber have also created some dense forests of small trees, making them wildfire prone and water thirsty, according to Williams-Claussen. 'I know a lot of people would look at the forested hillsides around here and be like, 'It's beautiful, it's forested.' But see that old growth on the hill, like way up there?' asked Sarah Beesley, fisheries biologist for the Yurok Tribe, sitting on a rock in Blue Creek. 'There's like one or two of those.' Fire bans, invasive plants and encroachment of unmanaged native species have contributed to loss of prairies, historically home to abundant elk and deer herds and where the Yurok gathered plants for cultural and medicinal uses. Western Rivers Conservancy bought and conveyed land to the tribe in phases. The $56 million for the conservation deal came from private capital, low interest loans, tax credits, public grants and carbon credit sales that will continue to support restoration. Restoration plans The tribe aims to restore historic prairies by removing invasive species and encroaching native vegetation. The prairies are important food sources for elk and the mardon skipper butterfly, said Kling from the conservancy. Trees removed from prairies will be used as logjams for creeks to create habitat for frogs, fish and turtles. The tribe will reintroduce fire to aid in prairie restoration and reestablish forest diversity and mature forests to help imperiled species bounce back. Members know its going to take decades of work for these lands and waterways to heal. 'And maybe all that's not going to be done in my lifetime,' said McCovey, the fisheries director. 'But that's fine, because I'm not doing doing this for myself.' ___ The Associated Press receives support from the Walton Family Foundation for coverage of water and environmental policy. The AP is solely responsible for all content. For all of AP's environmental coverage, visit
Toronto Star
22 minutes ago
- Toronto Star
New Zealand Parliament suspends 3 lawmakers who performed Māori haka in protest
WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — New Zealand legislators voted Thursday to enact record suspensions from Parliament for three lawmakers who performed a Māori haka to protest a proposed law. Hana-Rāwhiti Maipi-Clarke received a seven-day ban and the leaders of her political party, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer and Rawiri Waititi, were barred for 21 days. Three days had been the longest ban for a lawmaker from New Zealand's Parliament before.
