Erin Patterson mushroom trial: Accused triple murderer faces Supreme Court hearing in Morwell

The mother-of-two is accused of killing three people with poisonous death cap mushrooms.
Erin Patterson is facing trial at Latrobe Valley Law Courts.

Erin Patterson mushroom trial: Accused triple murderer faces Supreme Court hearing in Morwell

The mother-of-two is accused of killing three people with poisonous death cap mushrooms.

A mother accused of murdering three relatives and attempting to kill a fourth at a family lunch by serving up beef wellington with poisonous death cap mushrooms is standing trial at Latrobe Valley Law Court.

Erin Patterson, 50, has pleaded not guilty to murdering her former in-laws, Don and Gail Patterson, both 70, and Gail’s sister, Heather Wilkinson, 66, after the trio died days after attending a July 2023 lunch at her Leongatha home.

She has also pleaded not guilty to attempting to murder Heather’s Baptist pastor husband, Ian, 68, who spent months in hospital, but survived.

Her trial continues.

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Court has wrapped for the day.

Follow along tomorrow for more updates.

Erin Patterson to take the stand and give evidence at her triple-murder trial

The jury has been told Patterson will take the stand to give evidence at her triple-murder trial.

About 3.15pm on Monday, defence barrister Colin Mandy SC told the jury he will call Patterson as a witness.

“Your Honour, the defence will call Erin Patterson,” he said.

Court has wrapped up for the day

Court has finished for the day.

Follow along tomorrow for more updates.

‘Communication struggles’ led to Patterson and Simon’s separation, court hears

Patterson has told the jury about her marital issues with her estranged husband.

The court has previously heard the couple split several times between 2009 (just two years after their wedding) and their last separation in 2015.

Asked by Mandy how she and Simon handled the numerous separations over the course of their marriage, Patterson said they never allowed their children to become involved.

“I would say that even though our relationship was struggling, to cause a separation, it was really important to both of us to cooperate about (our son) and make it as easy as possible for him,” she said.

Mandy: “And was there any conflict between you as to how to look after (your son)?“

Patterson: “No, there wasn’t.”

Asked by Mandy what tension in their relationship caused the separations, Patterson said the pair had issues with communication.

“Primarily what we struggled with over the entire course of our relationship was if we had any problems we just couldn’t communicate well when we disagreed about something,” she said.

“We could never communicate in a way that made each of us feel heard and understood, so we would just feel hurt and wouldn’t know how to resolve it.”

Domestic holiday ended with Patterson and Simon separating, court hears

Patterson said Simon was keen for the family to resume the trip they had commenced before welcoming their son.

She said by April 2009, there son was settled and they decided to put everything into storage and travel around the country in their Nissan Patrol.

She said they didn’t have any time pressures, other than plans to meet Simon’s brother and his wife, and they headed north, through Alice Springs, up to Tenants Creek, then through Queensland up to Cairns.

She said they returned home around November 2009.

“It had been a good holiday, but I had had enough. I wanted to sleep in a real bed,” she said.

“It was getting harder to camp (with our son). When we left, he was three months old, and he slept a lot. By November, he was sitting up and crawling, and I had a gut full.”

Patterson said she and Simon spoke about her desire to return home and made the arrangement that she would fly home and he would drive home with their son, arriving around a week after her.

Patterson said she and her husband encountered their first marital separation when they returned back to Western Australia.

“When I got back to Perth, I rented a little cottage for me and (our son) to live in and Simon hired a caravan nearby,” she said.

Mandy: “And how long did you live like that? Separated?

Patterson: “Not very long, it was like one or two months. The separation was over by the end of January 2010.”

Patterson said while they lived in Perth they had “a lot” of visitors, including friends, Simon’s siblings, and Don and Gail who visited at least “once or twice a year”.

Patterson becomes emotional over son’s ‘traumatic’ birth

The court heard the couple’s son was born the following year, in January 2009.

“His birth was very traumatic. It went for a very long time and they tried to get him out with forceps and he wouldn’t come out and he started to go into distress and they lost his heartbeat, so they did an emergency caesarian and got him out quickly,” she said, her voice cracking with emotion.

Patterson said she had to remain in hospital for about a week, while her son remained in the neo-natal unit for a while.

She said by the time her son recovered and was ready to leave hospital, doctors still had concerns about her recovery and wanted her to stay.

“I said to Simon I don’t want to stay here, I want to go home, and he said ‘you can do it, just leave’,” she said.

Patterson said at that point she and Simon decided she would prematurely discharge herself from hospital.

Patterson said Don and Gail came to visit them shortly after their son’s birth.

Because they were living in a small Perth apartment, she said they rented a house down south that could accommodate them all.

“I remember being really relieved that Gail was there because I felt really out of my depth,” she said.

“I had no idea what to do with a baby and not confident. She was really supportive, and gentle, and patient with me.”

Patterson said Gail gave her advice about how to settle her son after a feed, interpret his cries, and told her to just “relax and enjoy it, you don’t have to stick to this timetable with your baby”.

Patterson’s parents did not attend her wedding

Patterson said she married Simon in Married in June 2007 at Korumburra Anglican Church.

“We wanted Ian and Heather to be able to come as guests rather than to have jobs for the day like they would have if we got married at Korumburra Baptist (Church),” she said.

Patterson said her parents were in Russia, on a train on holiday, at the time of their wedding and David Wilkinson, Ian and Heather’s son, walked her down the isle.

“Don and Gail hired a huge marquee and put on a huge buffet for everybody,” she said.

Patterson said at the time they were married, Simon was living in a Melbourne unit that belonged to his parents and she moved into it a month after their wedding.

She said the couple wanted to drive around Australia as part of their honeymoon plans.

“Simon gave notice at his job. We gave away everything we had. Bought a Nissan Patrol and hit the open road,” she said.

“We first went to Sydney, Simon had friends there he wanted us to stay with - so we did that. Then we slowly meandered our way west. We ended up in Perth around September ‘07.

Patterson said they went to Africa for a couple of months before eventually settling in Perth.

“Simon was keen to keep travelling, but I was keen to put down roots- to have babies.

“Simon got a job very quickly at a city shire council in Perth, we rented a house about 30 minutes south near the beach. I applied to go to uni and I got pregnant about March/April.”

Patterson converted to Christianity by husband, court hears

Patterson has told the court she met her estranged husband, Simon, while the pair both worked at Monash City Council in the early 2000s.

She said she was working in the RSPCA division while Simon was working in traffic engineering.

She said they initially would see eachother at work social events, such as lunch or after work drinks.

“I would say we became friends around November 2004 and we were friends only until July 2005. That is when we started dating,” she said.

“I was what you would probably call a fundamentalist atheist. I was very athiest. He was Christian.

“Through the course of those months, December ‘04, January ‘05, we had a lot of conversations about life, politics and religion and I was trying to convert him to become an atheist and things happened in reverse and I became a Christian.

Patterson said she first met Don and Gail during that period when she attended a service at Korumburra Baptist Church.

“It was the first church service I had ever been to,” she said.

“I remember being really excited because I had never been to a church service before. I had been to my sister’s wedding in a church, but I had never been to a service before.

“I remember that there was a banner up on the wall, behind where Ian was preaching. He was the pastor and he was giving the sermon that day.

“There was a banner that had on it “faith, hope, and love”. And Ian gave a sermon about it. There is a passage in the bible which talks about faith, hope, and love, and how love was the greatest of them.

“I had what could best be described as a spiritual experience and it quite overwhelmed me.”

‘I’d been fighting a never ending battle of low self-esteem most of my adult life’, Patterson says

Patterson has revealed she was struggling with self-esteem issues in July 2023.

“I’d been fighting a never ending battle of low self-esteem most of my adult life,” she said.

“And the further inroads I made into being middle aged, the less I felt about about myself. I suppose I put on more weight.”

Mandy: “Was it principally the weight issues?”

Patterson: “Yeah, I mean that was the largest, that was the bulk of it.”

“I was planning to have weight loss surgery. Is it gastric bypass? I was planning on doing that.”

Patterson has described her life in 2023

Under questioning by her defence barrister, Colin Mandy SC, Patterson was asked to describe her life in July 2023.

She said that she was financially comfortable to the point where she could afford to go to university without needing to work.

She said around that time she also had felt a shift in her relationship with Simon’s family.

“I had felt for some months that my relationship with the wider Patterson family had perhaps a lot more distance or space put between us,” she said.

“I had come to have concerns that Simon was not wanting me to be involved very much with the family any more.

“Perhaps I was not being invited as much to family things.”

Asked by Mandy how her relationship was with Simon, Patterson said it was “functional” and centred on discussions about their kids.

Patterson has taken the stand

Erin Patterson has taken the stand.

She is wearing a dark, paisley-patterned, long-sleeved shirt and has thick-framed glasses.

She set her glasses down beside her on the table after taking a seat.

Erin Patterson to take the stand and give evidence at her triple-murder trial

The jury has been told Patterson will take the stand to give evidence at her triple-murder trial.

About 3.15pm on Monday, defence barrister Colin Mandy SC told the jury he will call Patterson as a witness.

“Your Honour, the defence will call Erin Patterson,” he said.