Australia mushroom trial live: defence set to conclude closing address in murder trial of Erin Patterson
Key events
Mandy turns to the prosecution’s argument that his client avoided medical treatment because she knew she did not have death cap mushroom poisoning.
Mandy says evidence that Patterson was initially reluctant to receive treatment is contradictory to a person faking an illness.
“If you’re pretending to be sick, you’re going to be saying to the medical staff: ‘hook me up, pump me full of drugs …’”
Mandy says the prosecution argued Patterson’s phone records showed she did not simply go home and then return to the hospital after she discharged herself.
The prosecution said the records were consistent with Paterson travelling south-west of Leongatha.
Mandy says the location timeline shows the connections to Outtrim on that occasion were for “less than three minutes”.
Telecommunications expert Dr Matthew Sorell provided alternative possibilities which the prosecution ignored, Mandy says.
He points to Sorell saying one explanation was that the phone was pinging another base station as they moved from the front to the back of their house.
Defence turns to why Patterson discharged herself from hospital
Mandy turns to the evidence about Patterson discharging herself from Leongtha hospital against medical advice two days after the lunch.
Mandy says his client testified that she arrived at the hospital thinking she would just be admitted to get some fluids for gastroenteritis.
“She was not prepared for what she walked into … Where she was told she’d be admitted and transferred to a different hospital in Melbourne,” he says.
“She was not refusing treatment. She was saying there were things she needed to do before she was admitted and transferred.
“She was struggling to process what she was being told.”
Mandy says Patterson’s mind turned to the “practical considerations”.
Patterson told the jury she left the hospital to pack her daughter’s ballet bag and attend to her pets.
Coffee or tea and a trip to Tyabb
Mandy says Patterson’s son told police he saw his mother drinking a coffee the morning after the lunch. Patterson, who said she had diarrhoea at this point, said she was drinking herbal tea.
He rhetorically asks if Patterson son was “watching his mother like a hawk all morning?”
Mandy says Patterson’s son was not focused on his mother. He accuses the prosecution of ignoring other evidence from Patterson’s son that his mother “didn’t sound like her happy self” that morning.
Mandy turns to the evidence about Patterson driving her son to a flying lesson in Tyabb, which was later cancelled, the day after the lunch.
“The crown theory, of course, is that she is faking being ill,” Mandy says.
“Why would she go on this journey to Tyabb if she was faking being unwell?”
Patterson told the jury that on the journey to Tyabb she pulled over on the highway and went to the toilet in a bush. Patterson’s son told police he did not remember his mother going to the toilet, or any stops on the journey.
This is despite the jury seeing CCTV footage of Patterson stopping at a service station en route to Tyabb.
Mandy says Patterson’s son did not recall the toilet stop or service station stop.
Mandy touches on his address yesterday where he said Patterson may have become unwell earlier than her lunch guests because she was tasting the mushroom duxelles for the beef wellington while she was cooking it.
Patterson testified that she added dried mushrooms to the dish after she tasted it and noticed it was bland. Patterson told the trial it was possible she had added foraged mushrooms to a Tupperware container with store-bought dried mushrooms that she used in the dish.
Mandy acknowledges there is no evidence that Patterson tasted the dish after adding the dried mushrooms.
He tells the jury: “But using your common sense you might expect that that’s exactly what’s happened.”
‘Erin Patterson was not an atheist,’ defence says
Mandy turns to the evidence of one of Patterson’s online friends, Christine Hunt.
He says Hunt was not part of the smaller Facebook group chat where Patterson messaged friends about her in-laws, Don and Gail.
Mandy says Hunt was asked about Patterson’s religious views while those in the smaller group chat were not. He says this is an example of the prosecution picking and choosing evidence that suits them and ignoring others.
Hunt previously testified that Patterson told a wider Facebook group she was an atheist.
“Erin Patterson was not an atheist,” Mandy says.
Judge outlines trial timeline
The jurors have entered the court room in Morwell.
Justice Christopher Beale tells the jury he will begin instructing them on Tuesday, before they begin their deliberations. He says his instructions, called the judge’s charge, will take two days.
“I’m working hard to try and compress it,” he says.
Beale says Patterson’s defence lawyer, Colin Mandy SC, will conclude his closing address today.
What the jury heard on Wednesday
Here’s what the jury heard yesterday:
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Patterson’s defence lawyer, Colin Mandy SC, said his client was “not on trial for being a liar”. He told jurors the court was not one of “moral judgment”.
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The prosecution’s case that Patterson wanted her estranged husband, Simonto attend the lunch so she could kill him was “absurd”, Mandy said.
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The defence said the jury should reject the evidence from the sole surviving lunch guest, Ian Wilkinsonthat Patterson served her guests on four large grey plates while eating from an orangey-tan coloured plate. Mandy said Ian was “honestly mistaken”.
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Mandy said the December 2022 Facebook group chat messages, where Patterson said her in-laws were a “lost cause”, were being used by the prosecution as a distraction from the evidence in the case. He said the messages, which related to a disagreement over child support with Simonstood out because they were about the only disagreement between Patterson and her in-laws.
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Mandy says online searches about death cap mushrooms – discovered on a computer police seized from Patterson’s house – showed his client’s “idle curiosity” and was not a person “carefully studying this information”.
Welcome to day 35 of Erin Patterson’s triple murder trial.
Patterson’s defence lawyer, Colin Mandy SC, will continue delivering his closing address to the jury when the trial resumes from 10.30am.
Justice Christopher Beale has told the jury he will begin instructing them on Monday, before their deliberations. He said this “could spill” into next Wednesday. Once this is concluded, the jury will retire to consider its verdict.
Patterson, 50, faces three charges of murder and one charge of attempted murder relating to a beef wellington lunch she served at her house in Leongatha, in regional Victoria, on 29 July 2023.
She is accused of murdering her in-laws, Don and Gail Pattersonand her estranged husband’s aunt, Heather Wilkinson. The attempted murder charge relates to Heather’s husband, Ian.
She has pleaded not guilty to the charges.
The prosecution alleges Patterson deliberately poisoned her lunch guests with “murderous intent”, but her lawyers say the poisoning was a tragic accident.
