Woman in triple murder case: Mushrooms possibly found in food

Woman in triple murder case: Mushrooms possibly found in food

In Brisbane, Australia, Erin Patterson is on trial after being accused of murdering three guests with a dish laced with deadly death cap mushrooms. During the trial on Wednesday, she explained that she may have accidentally added edible mushrooms to the lunch because her duxelles tasted "a little bland."

The crime occurred in July 2023

On the third day of evidence, Patterson was questioned about the events of July 2023, when she is accused of deliberately adding deadly death cap mushrooms to a beef Wellington she was preparing for four guests, including her in-laws, at her home in the small Australian town of Leongatha in rural Victoria. Patterson denies three counts of murdering her in-laws, Don and Gail Patterson, and Gail's sister, Heather Wilkinson. She also denies allegations that she tried to kill the fourth guest, Heather's husband Ian Wilkinson, her local pastor.

The preparation of the ingredients

In the days leading up to the lunch, defense lawyer Colin Mandy questioned SC Patterson about purchasing the ingredients. She explained that all the ingredients were from Woolworths, a large Australian supermarket. Patterson said she took the recipe from a cookbook, which she followed with "a few variations." For example, she couldn't find a whole fillet of beef, so she purchased individual steaks. She would have left out the mustard that was called for in the recipe because Don “doesn’t eat pork.” On Saturday morning, she sauteed garlic and shallots and chopped store-bought mushrooms in a food processor. She cooked the mixture, known as duxelles, for about 45 minutes so that it would become dry and not make the dough soggy.

The fatal decision

Patterson told the court that she tried the mixture and found it "a little bland." So she added dried mushrooms that she had previously stored in a plastic container in the pantry. When Mandy asked her what she thought was in the container, she replied: "I thought it was just the mushrooms I bought in Melbourne." Mandy further asked, “So what do you think might have been in that container?” She replied, “Now I think there may have been wild mushrooms in there too.” Her voice broke at that.

Consequences after eating

Patterson reported that Ian and Heather Wilkinson ate all of their food. Don finished what Gail didn't eat, while Patterson only ate about a quarter or a third of her beef wellington because she talked a lot and ate slowly. After lunch they cleaned up and sat down to an orange cake that Gail had brought. Patterson said she ate one piece of cake after another until she ended up consuming two-thirds of the original cake.

She expressed that she felt overfull and went to the toilet where she vomited. She had previously told the court that she had suffered from bulimia throughout her life and was very self-conscious about her figure. She felt nauseous after lunch and took medication for diarrhea in the evening. The next day she missed Sunday service because of the same symptoms and continued to suffer from diarrhea.

The suspicion of poisonous mushrooms

The night after lunch, she removed the dough and mushrooms from the leftover Beef Wellington and microwaved the meat for the kids to eat for dinner. The next Monday she went to the hospital because of possible dehydration, where a doctor told her that she might have come into contact with death cap mushrooms. Patterson said: “I was shocked and confused.” She couldn't explain how death cap mushrooms could have gotten into the dish.

Prior knowledge about mushrooms

Earlier Wednesday, Patterson told the court that she had not visited any websites that showed the locations of death caps near her home. Although she was aware of the danger of these mushrooms and had searched for information online, she found that they did not grow in her area.

Patterson also mentioned that she had been looking for mushrooms at the Korumburra Botanical Gardens in May 2023 and may have picked some near oak trees. It has already been heard in court that death cap mushrooms grow near oak trees.

The discovery and its consequences

She explained that she would dehydrate any mushrooms that she didn't want to use right away and store them in plastic containers in the pantry. At this time she also purchased dried mushrooms from an Asian grocer in Melbourne. Because of their strong smell, she put them in a plastic container in the pantry. Mandy asked her if she remembered putting wild mushrooms that she had dehydrated in May or June 2023 into a container that already contained other dried mushrooms. Patterson confirmed, “Yes, I did.”

During the trial, Patterson recalled a conversation with her husband, Simon, while his parents were critically ill in the hospital. She mentioned that she had dried mushrooms in the dehydrator. Simon had then asked, “Did you poison my parents like that by using that dehydrator?”

That remark got her thinking: "It got me thinking about all the times I had used the dehydrator and how I had dried wild mushrooms in it weeks before. I started thinking, what if they had gotten into the container with the Chinese mushrooms? Maybe, maybe that's what happened."

Patterson further explained that she was responsible for three factory resets of her phone. Her son had done the first one. She knew there were pictures of mushrooms and the dehydrator in her Google Photos. “I just panicked and didn’t want them to see her,” she said, referring to investigators.

Patterson's evidence continues.