Erin Patterson accepts beef wellington served at fatal lunch contained death cap mushrooms, triple murder trial hears

Erin Patterson has told a court the majority of the mushrooms in beef wellingtons served in her Leongatha home came from a local supermarket, but says she also accepts the dish contained death caps.

Patterson also said in evidence that she wishes she never told her Facebook friends in a private group chat “this family I swear to fucking god” in relation to her in-laws, saying she felt ashamed but hoped that sharing her frustrations would mean she had a “big cheer squad” for her problems.

The jury in her triple murder trial also heard that she was never diagnosed with ovarian cancer and had a history of “consulting Dr Google”, and hoped to bring her family back together despite a formal separation with her estranged husband, Simon, seven years earlier.

In her second day in the witness box, Patterson was also asked about her relationship with Simon changing after a dispute about child support which arose the year before the alleged murders.

Patterson, 50, faces three charges of murder and one charge of attempted murder relating to poisoning her four lunch guests – relatives of Simon – with a beef wellington served at her house in Leongatha on 29 July 2023.

Patterson has pleaded not guilty to murdering Simon’s parents, Don and Gail Patterson, and his aunt Heather Wilkinson, and attempting to murder Ian Wilkinson, Simon’s uncle and Heather’s husband.

Illustration: Guardian design

Lawyers for Patterson say the death cap mushroom poisoning was a tragic and terrible accident.

Under questioning from her lawyer, Colin Mandy SC, on Tuesday, Patterson spoke about a time in late 2022 when she was in discussion with Simon and Don and Gail about two issues within the family: finances for their children, and the struggles of their son.

Don and Gail were asked by Patterson to mediate between her and Simon, as they had done so before, she said.

The court was shown a series of messages about these issues, including Don apologising for possibly misrepresenting Simon, and Patterson saying she appreciates it is uncomfortable.

“Simon seems to be under the misapprehension that a child support assessment covers every expense for the children under the sun,” Patterson wrote in December 2022.

Patterson was also asked about a “heated” exchange she and Simon had after she felt she had not been invited to a pub lunch for Gail’s 70th.

At the same time she was discussing these issues with Simon and his parents, Patterson was posting to her friends on a group chat.

She said she sent the messages because “I was really hurt and really frustrated and felt a little bit desperate” in the Facebook chat, which “became a safe venting space for all of us”.

Of a message previously read to the court, in which she said “this family, I swear to fucking god”, Patterson told the court: “I wish I’d never said it, I feel ashamed for saying it, and I wish that the family didn’t have to hear that I said that.

“They didn’t deserve it.”

Members of the Patterson and Wilkinson families, including Ian Wilkinson, were in court on Tuesday.

From left: mushroom lunch guests Don Patterson, Gail Patterson, Heather Wilkinson and Ian Wilkinson

Patterson, who was also asked about a separate message when she wrote she was “sick of this shit”, wanted nothing to do with the Pattersons, and wrote “fuck em”, said that she shared her frustrations as “I knew that the women would probably support me being annoyed about those things, and so I said that to them, knowing that they would latch on, and then it [becomes] a big cheer squad for your problem, if that makes sense”.

In the early afternoon, Mandy said: “I’m going to ask you some questions now about mushrooms.”

Patterson said she started to become interested in wild mushrooms in early 2020, as she noticed them while walking during Covid lockdowns around Korumburra.

“Had you always liked eating mushrooms,” Mandy asked.

“Yeah I had,” she responded.

“They taste good, and they’re very healthy.”

She particularly enjoyed exotic mushrooms because of their interesting flavour, she said.

Patterson also said she dehydrated mushrooms she foraged, and kept them in a container in her pantry, along with another container of dried mushrooms purchased from an Asian grocer in Melbourne.

When asked where the mushrooms in the beef wellington came from, Patterson said: “The vast majority came from the local Woolworths in Leongatha. There were some from the grocer in Melbourne.”

Mandy earlier asked Patterson: “Do you accept there must have been death cap mushrooms in there?”

“Yes, I do,” she replied.

Patterson talked about picking wild mushrooms, saying at one point she found mushrooms growing on the three-acre property where she was living at the time, and decided to test if it was safe to eat.

“I fried it up with some butter, ate it, saw what happened … [it] tasted good,” she said.

Patterson said she then started using these mushrooms in other dishes, including some fed to her children.

She later found other mushrooms growing in a paddock to the rear of the property where the lunch was hosted.

Wild mushrooms were picked around the area during foraging between 2020 and 2023, she said, including from areas under oak trees.

Patterson also spoke about receiving inheritances from her grandmother and mother, which allowed her to loan about $1.2m to Simon’s siblings and their partners, and for her to buy several properties and travel extensively overseas.

The court heard Patterson had opened a second-hand bookshop in the Western Australian town of Pemberton before she moved back to Victoria with Simon and their son while she was pregnant with the couple’s daughter.

The reason for the move, she said, was to be closer to Don and Gail after the birth, and because their son loved spending time with his “nanna and papa” and cousins.

Another series of separations between her and Simon continued, until a “formal” separation in late 2015.

Patterson said that despite this she included his name on the title of the Leongatha property which she moved into in 2022, as she wanted to show him something “tangible” about her desire for the family to reunite.

“That was what I wanted. I did that because I wanted some way to demonstrate with Simon that’s what I really believed and wanted,” she said.

Patterson appeared to become emotional when she was asked how her relationship with Don and Gail changed after this “formal” separation.

“It never changed,” she said.

“I was just their daughter in law, and they just continued to love me.”

Patterson also told the court about a history of health issues she and her children had which eroded her faith in the medical system.

She never had ovarian cancer, nor a needle biopsy, she said. The court has previously heard about text messages she exchanged with Gail about the biopsy, and it is the prosecution case that Patterson used a cancer diagnosis as a “false pretence” for the lunch.

Patterson said both sides of her family had a history of ovarian cancer, and she feared she also had it.

“I’d been having, for a few months by then, a multitude of symptoms,” Patterson said.

“I felt very fatigued. I had ongoing abdominal pain. I had chronic headaches. I put on a lot of weight, in quite a short period of time, and like my feet and my hands seemed to retain a lot of fluid.”

She said what “sent me over the edge” to go to a GP was that her wedding rings wouldn’t fit any more, and that when she then went to pick them up from the jeweller, after having them resized, they again didn’t fit.

At this time, and at another occasion when she feared she had a brain tumour, she “consulted Dr Google”.

She came to realise, she said, that doing this wasted her time, and the time of medical professionals, but she had come to distrust the medical system because of how it had handled issues with her children.

Patterson was also asked about a history of issues with food, which she said started when her mother forced her to be weighed every week as a child to ensure she had not put on weight.

In her 20s, she said she started binge eating, with its intensity sometimes meaning it occurred every day.

She ate everything she could get her hands on, and then vomited it up again, she said.

Patterson’s evidence continues.