Cook denies sixth meal was for husband: Court
Alleged death cap mushroom cook Erin Patterson has told her triple-murder trial a sixth beef Wellington she had prepared was 'just an extra one'.
Ms Patterson, 50, is facing trial accused of murdering three of her husband's relatives with a deliberately poisoned lunch she hosted in the country Victorian town of Leongatha on July 29, 2023.
She is also accused of the attempted murder of a fourth relative, who recovered after falling ill. She has pleaded not guilty to all charges.
Prosecutors allege she spiked the meal with death cap mushrooms with 'murderous intent' while her defence say she did not intend to poison anyone and the case is a tragic accident.
Don Patterson, his wife Gail Patterson and Gail's sister Heather Wilkinson died in the week following the lunch while Heather's husband Ian Wilkinson survived. Erin Patterson has pleaded not guilty to counts of murder and attempted murder. Supplied. Credit: Supplied
Giving evidence at her trial on Tuesday, Ms Patterson was quizzed about a sixth beef Wellington she prepared ahead of the lunch.
She denied a suggestion by Crown prosecutor Nanette Rogers SC the dish was made for Simon Patterson, her estranged husband if he changed his mind and attended.
'I didn't make that sixth one for Simon,' she replied.
'I did not make that one for him … it was just an extra one. Simon wasn't coming.'
Earlier in the trial, Simon Patterson told the jury he'd been invited two weeks before the lunch alongside his parents and aunt and uncle, initially agreeing to attend.
But the evening before the lunch, he texted Ms Patterson to decline.
'Sorry, I feel too uncomfortable about coming to the lunch with you, mum, dad, Heather & Ian tomorrow,' the message read. Simon Patterson was called as the prosecution's first witness. NewsWire / David Geraghty Credit: News Corp Australia
Ms Patterson responded saying it was 'really disappointing' and urging Simon to change his mind.
'I've spent many hours this week preparing lunch for tomorrow … and spent a small fortune on beef eye fillet to make beef Wellingtons because I wanted it to be a special meal,' she wrote.
'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.'
Ms Patterson told the jury she was 'hurt' Simon didn't want to come and may have exaggerated.
'I guess I wanted him to feel a little bit bad about cancelling at the last minute after he would have known I'd done a lot of preparation,' she said.
Asked last week what happened to the sixth beef Wellington, Ms Patterson told the jury she placed it into her fridge to deal with later.
She said she served the meal, with the pastry and mushroom scrapped off, to her two children for dinner the day following the lunch.
Ms Patterson denied a suggestion by Dr Rogers that she did not feed the meat from this meal to her children, but she did agree the meat was removed.
'I did do that,' the accused woman said.
'And where was it put?' Dr Rogers asked.
'Into my children's stomachs,' Ms Patterson responded.
The trial, now in its seventh week, continues.
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The Age
5 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.
Sydney Morning Herald
5 hours ago
- Sydney Morning Herald
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.
West Australian
6 hours ago
- West Australian
Erin Patterson trial: Cook breaks her silence after eight days on the stand for triple-murder case
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. 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. 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 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. 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. 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.
