By Emma Freylink
On the afternoon of the 29th of July 2023, Erin Patterson and four of her in-laws gathered around her dining room table and dug into the Beef Wellington she’d spent several hours preparing. The next day, all five of them reported suffering from severe gastroenteritis, and four of them would be admitted to the hospital. News soon broke that they were being treated for suspected death cap mushroom poisoning, and a week later, three of the lunch guests had died, and the fourth was in a coma. Erin, on the other hand, had miraculously recovered and was allowed to return home.
Within days, the media started speculating about whether she’d intentionally poisoned her guests, and as investigators began combing through phone records, hospital reports and the remnants of the meal itself, a quiet family lunch transformed into one of the most gripping and disturbing criminal cases in modern Australian history.
The Fatal Lunch
At around 11 in the morning of the 29th of July 2023, 69-year-old Pastor Ian Wilkinson and his wife of 50 years, 66-year-old Heather, were travelling by car to Leongatha, a town which is located 135 km southeast of Melbourne in County Victoria, Australia. Also in the car was Heather’s older sister, the 70-year-old Gail Patterson, and her husband, 70-year-old Don.
Don and Gail’s daughter-in-law, 48-year-old Erin Patterson, had invited them over to lunch two weeks earlier. Erin was married to their son, Simon Patterson, but the two of them had been separated for several years by this point. The family’s relationship with Erin had also soured a bit over the last two years, so they’d been surprised when she’d approached them after church one day and invited Simon, his parents, and his aunt and uncle over to lunch. According to Ian:
“We were very happy to be invited. It seemed like maybe our relationship with Erin was going to improve.”
When they arrived at Erin’s home in Leongatha, they noted that the sixth member of their group, Simon, must have decided not to join them for lunch that day, since his car wasn’t in its usual spot. He had, in fact, cancelled the previous day, and had told Erin that he’d felt too ‘uncomfortable’ at the thought of sharing a lunch with her and his parents.
Erin invited them in, and because Pastor Ian and Heather had never been to her newly constructed house, she took them on a quick tour. According to Ian, Heather was especially interested in taking a look at Erin’s pantry, since they were in the process of adding one onto their own kitchen. He did note that Erin didn’t seem comfortable with the idea that they were going to be snooping around her kitchen, and he assumed that it was probably messy because she’d been busy preparing lunch for all of them. So, because he didn’t want to embarrass her, he’d elected not to join the two women on their tour of the pantry.
After going on a tour of Erin’s garden, they finally sat down to lunch. Heather and Gail had offered to help Erin carry the dishes out to the dining room table, and they ended up bringing four dinner plates to the table. Pastor Ian would later testify that he wasn’t sure whether the plates were white or grey, but he did note that each plate contained some kind of pastry, and he’d watched as the two women set the plates down onto the table. Erin followed the two women with a smaller “rusty brown” or terracotta-coloured plate of her own and then placed it down at her spot at the table.
The five of them took their seats, said grace, and then dished up some of the beans and mashed potatoes that Erin had prepared for them. The pastry turned out to be individual beef wellingtons, and Erin explained that it’d been cheaper to buy several pieces of ribeye steak than to buy a tenderloin that was large enough to feed 6 people. So, she’d covered each piece of steak in its own mushroom duxelles (which consists of minced and sauteed mushrooms, garlic, shallots, onions and parsley), wrapped them up in pastry, and then popped them into the oven.
It was her first time making it, but they all reassured her that it was delicious. Ian and Heather finished their portions, but halfway through the meal, Gail jokingly complained that she was already stuffed and that she wouldn’t be able to finish her food on her own. According to Ian, Don then eagerly took it upon himself to finish her portion for her and joked that it was his right as her husband.
After they’d finished their meal, Erin brought out a serving dish covered in pieces of fresh fruit that Heather had brought along, and then announced that she had some bad news to share with everyone. She told her lunch guests that she’d recently learned that she has ovarian cancer, and she wasn’t sure how to break the news to the kids.
Pastor Ian offered to pray for Erin, and afterwards, they sat and discussed her options. At some point that afternoon, they were interrupted when Erin’s 14-year-old son returned home. Pastor Ian announced that he had a meeting at the church at around 5 that afternoon, so they all said their goodbyes and went home. Overall, Heather and Pastor Ian had thought that the lunch had been delicious, and they said as much to the people they met up with that evening.
At around 11 pm that night, Pastor Ian woke up to the sound of Heather vomiting. He didn’t feel too good himself, and shortly after she’d returned to bed, he had to rush to the bathroom. According to Pastor Ian, they’d “camped out” by two different toilets all night, and on the morning of the 30th of July, they were both feeling tired and weak. They figured that they’d eaten some bad meat during lunch the previous day and now had gastro, but didn’t think any more of it.
Just after 7 am, Simon Patterson knocked on their door. He told them that Don and Gail were already on their way to the Korumburra Hospital, and after he’d confirmed that his aunt and uncle were also ill, he called for an ambulance to come and pick them up. However, the ambulance service informed them that it would take too long to get a team out to the house, and that it would be faster if Simon took them to the hospital himself.
So, Simon helped them to gather their things and then helped them to the car. On the way to the Leongatha Hospital, Heather told Simon that they suspected that the meat Erin had used in the beef Wellington had been off. Then she asked Simon why Erin’s dinner plates didn’t match. Confused, Simon asked her what she meant, and Heather explained that when they’d gone to collect the dishes, Erin had dished out the individual beef wellingtons – only her plate was different from theirs.
Was it on purpose, or were her plates simply mismatched?
When they arrived at the Leongatha hospital shortly after 8 am that morning, Heather and Pastor Ian were both taken through to the triage section. The doctors in the ER immediately started treating them for gastroenteritis, and a short while later, they were both admitted to the ward. The nurses asked them several questions about what could have caused it, and they told them about the beef Wellingtons. They also informed the nursing staff that Don and Gail were also ill, but that they didn’t know whether or not Erin was also suffering from food poisoning.
According to Pastor Ian, they’d both started feeling better after they’d arrived at the hospital, and they both fell asleep shortly after. They seemed to improve during the night, but when they woke up on the morning of the 31st of July, they were immediately rushed to the urgent care centre, where they were introduced to Dr Chris Webster.
He explained that he had been in contact with the Korumburra Hospital and Dr Beth Morgan, the doctor who was treating Don and Gail, and she’d confirmed that they all had similar symptoms. Earlier that morning, Dr Morgan had called Dr Webster back and informed him that they’d been able to confirm that Don and Gail were suffering from amanita poisoning, and that it’s more than likely that the mushroom duxelles in the beef wellingtons had contained death cap mushrooms. Since they’d all eaten the same meal, this meant that Pastor Ian and Heather were also suffering from it, and unfortunately, it was lethal.
Dr Webster explained to the couple that death cap mushrooms contained amatoxins, a type of alkaloid that destroys the protein in your cells. This happens in three stages:
Stage 1 is known as the Gastrointestinal phase, and it occurs between 6 and 24 hours after you’ve ingested a death cap mushroom. The symptoms are similar to gastroenteritis, namely nausea and vomiting, bloody diarrhoea or urine, abdominal pain, dehydration, and fever.
Stage 2 occurs between 12 and 36 hours after ingestion, and based on the timeline Pastor Ian and Heather had provided, it’s the stage they were on. Stage 2 is referred to as the ‘Latent Phase’, and during this time, you might feel that you’re starting to recover. However, by this point, the toxin had already entered your bloodstream, and with every heartbeat, it’s making its way through your organs and breaking them down cell by cell.
Stage 3 is known as the ‘Hepatorenal Phase’, and it begins between three and six days after ingestion. During this stage, you would have high levels of acid in your blood, and your liver and kidneys would begin to shut down. You’ll start to appear jaundiced, you’ll start suffer from low blood sugar, and you’ll become delirious and confused. And unless something can be done to keep your liver and kidneys from shutting down, your organs will start dying one by one, and you will end up passing away.
In short, they had maybe another four or five days left to live.
According to Pastor Ian, Dr Webster’s biggest concern was the damage that the toxin was doing to their liver, and he explained that they were going to do everything in their power to help them pull through. They gave them several medications to help protect their livers, which included a dose of Silibinin, which is derived from milk thistle and is considered to be an antidote to amanita poisoning, and performed blood tests on them to confirm the diagnosis. Afterwards, Pastor Ian, Heather, Don and Gail would all be transferred to the Dandenong (Dandy-nong) Hospital in Melbourne since they were better equipped to treat them.
While they were waiting for the ambulances to arrive, Pastor Ian overheard the nurses say that Erin had also been admitted to the hospital and that she was also showing symptoms of gastroenteritis. Then, just before he was loaded into the first ambulance, he overheard the nurses say that Erin had left the hospital and that Dr Webster was looking for her.
Shortly after they arrived at Dandy-nong Hospital in Melbourne, Pastor Ian, Heather, Don, and Gail were all placed in separate rooms in the ICU. Pastor Ian remembers being given some charcoal in an attempt to flush out the last of the toxin from his system, but not much about what came after.
According to their son, David, they’d all been in incredible pain. Heather had been desperate for water and repeatedly told the medical staff that it felt like her “insides were burning”. Pastor Ian reportedly had:
“black lips, a gaunt face, and a pained and serious expression”
Later that same day, he and Heather were moved to the ICU, where they had to be intubated and placed in an induced coma.
Don, who’d consumed the largest portion of beef wellington, was deteriorating faster than the others, and he’d already been admitted to the ICU with multiple organ failure. In an attempt to save his life, the hospital arranged for him to receive an emergency liver transplant. He and Gail were transferred to the Austin Hospital in Melbourne on the 2nd of August, with Heather and Pastor Ian following later the same day.
Their children would later testify that before Don went into the operating theatre on the 3rd of August, the medical staff had wheeled Gail in to see him, and the two were given the opportunity to say goodbye. Then Gail returned to her own room, fully aware that she had maybe a day or two left to live.
Despite the liver transfer, Don started actively dying not long after his surgery finished, so the doctors changed their strategy when it came to treating the others.
The doctors determined that both Gail and Heather were too weak to undergo surgery, but Pastor Ian underwent keyhole surgery during which the doctors were able to determine that his bowels hadn’t been damaged by the toxin. He, Heather and Gail were given high doses of Vitamin C and other medication to help support their livers, as well as several rounds of blood plasma to replace the blood proteins that the toxin kept destroying.
Despite all of this, both Gail and Heather passed away on the morning of the 4th of August, 2023. Don passed away on the evening of the 5th of August. Their autopsies would later reveal that the toxins had done irreparable damage to their organs, and their intestines had become necrotic.
But by the evening of the 5th of August, Pastor Ian slowly started showing signs of improvement. Over several days, the levels of acid in his blood dropped, and his liver function returned to normal. By the 12th of August, he was able to breathe on his own again. On the 21st of August, he was discharged from the ICU, and by the 11th of September, he was sent to a rehabilitation ward.
Still, the doctors didn’t consider him to be recovered until the 23rd of September 2013, when he was finally discharged from the hospital, and even then, he never did fully recover.
And in April 2025, Pastor Ian stood up in court and testified against the woman who’d not only murdered his wife of 50 years, but had attempted to take his life as well: Erin Patterson.
Scutter the Nutter
Erin Trudi Scutter was born on the 30th of September 1974 in Melbourne and was the youngest of two children. Her father, Eitan Scutter, was a businessman and reportedly held several directorship roles at different companies. And her mother, Dr Heather Scutter, was a literary expert who specialised in children’s literature and who taught at Monash University. But according to Erin, they didn’t exactly have a happy childhood:
“We had a horrible upbringing. Mum was essentially a cold robot. It was like being brought up in a Russian orphanage where they don’t touch babies. That’s what my psych reckons. She said she wishes she could have studied my mum.”
Erin also described her mother as being ‘cold’ and ‘controlling’, and claims that she kept their father from showing their children any affection for fear that he’d “spoil” them.
According to Simon, Erin was diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome – aka, autism – as a teenager, and she struggled to make friends. Erin did really well in school because she was placed in an advanced program at University High School in Melbourne, and in the Stan Original documentary Revealed – Death Cap Murders, Investigative Journalist Marta Pascual Juanola explains that:
“This is the kind of program that eventually produces surgeons, lawyers, and people who go on to have pretty stellar careers.”
But Erin must have missed the memo. She went on to study science at the University of Melbourne, and at some point switched over to accounting. She finished her degree and did the required three years of training, but then somehow ended up training to become an air traffic controller with Air Services Australia when she was 27.
More than one person would point out that Erin was far more intelligent than she seemed, which is proved by the fact that she was one of only 14 people to have passed the ‘notoriously difficult’ entry exam that year. According to Rob Maggs, a former Air Traffic Controller and one of Erin’s old colleagues:
“Only 2% of the population have the required combination of skills to do the job effectively …There’s no room for error.”
Some of her ex-colleagues would explain that they all grew to be pretty close since they were such a small group of people. However, Erin was considered to be ‘an odd loner’, and they explained that she could be ‘abrupt and abrasive’ and ‘quite aggressive’ when she spoke to people. According to Rob, they’d been in the middle of training on the air traffic simulators one day when the Head of Training walked past and tripped over the cable of Erin’s headset.
“He got his foot caught in it and it pulled the headset off her head. Without blinking, she just turned around and snapped, ‘are you alright, you buffoon?’ The room went silent, essentially. Everybody just stopped. It was shocking, but in the end it wasn’t surprising that it came from Erin.”
Based on that little anecdote, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that Erin didn’t make any friends while she was working for Air Services Australia, and her colleagues reportedly called her “Crazy Erin” and “Scutter the Nutter” behind her back. They also confided in ABC News that Erin could be quite vindictive and mean, and she would steal work slots from some of her colleagues by calling in sick on their behalf. And yet, whenever tax season came around, she offered to help them with their tax returns since she knew all the loopholes that would result in them being able to pay less taxes.
Towards the end of her second year working at Air Services Australia, Erin got into trouble for consistently leaving work 30 minutes before her shift was over. She’d initially denied this, but when HR confronted her with the CCTV footage of her car leaving the premises, she just shrugged and said, ‘Well, you got me.’ According to Rob:
“Her being terminated wasn’t a surprise. She was going to do something or say something eventually that would put enough people’s noses out of joint to cause issues for herself.”
Erin was eventually let go and then got a job working in animal management for the RSPCA in 2003. Their offices were based in the City of Monash’s council building, and Erin would end up befriending some of the men who worked in the same building as her. One of them, Jay Westall, would later explain that they all got the impression that Erin was lonely and desperately wanted to feel a sense of community. She didn’t have a close relationship with either of her parents or her older sister, and she didn’t seem to have many friends outside of work.
Jay would eventually introduce Erin to another friend of his – a council engineer named Simon Patterson – and he and Erin seemed to click immediately. According to Jay:
“I think what attracted Erin to Simon at first was his intelligence and how friendly and gregarious he is in company. I think also that there was a built-in community around him, with church and a big family as well, which Erin didn’t seem to have.”
Simon and Erin started dating in or around June 2005, and she’d regularly go camping with him and his friends. Erin had also been planning on doing a solo cycle tour of Australia with her dogs, and Simon dutifully helped her plot out her routes. According to Jay, he’d been sceptical when he heard about her plan to go on a cycling tour, since Erin didn’t own a bicycle, and in his opinion, she wasn’t exactly what you’d call fit. So, it didn’t surprise him that her little cycle tour ended after just three days.
Erin had called Simon and asked him to come and fetch her, and when he asked her where she was, she said she’d decided to throw in the towel when she’d reached Korumburra, which was only 100 km away from where they lived. It also just so happened to be Simon’s hometown, and when Simon arrived in Korumburra an hour later, Erin allegedly suggested that it was the perfect excuse for him to introduce her to his family.
According to Simon, Erin immediately took a liking to Don and Gail. According to some reports, Don was well-read and intelligent, and Simon would later explain that his dad could discuss any topic under the sun – and usually knew more about it than whoever he was speaking to. Gail, on the other hand, was a retired schoolteacher, and she immediately made Erin feel at home. Erin would also later testify that Gail quickly became like a second mother to her.
While they were visiting Simon’s parents, Simon asked Erin if she would like to accompany him and his family to church. His uncle, Ian Wilkinson, was the local pastor at the Baptist church, and Simon told her that he was still pretty involved in the church community.
Erin agreed and would later explain that she’d always considered herself to be a fundamentalist atheist. But during this church service, she had an almost ‘spiritual experience’.
“I remember being really excited about it because I’d never been to a church service before.”
“[Ian] was the pastor, and he was giving a sermon that day. And there was a banner [behind him, and] it has on it ‘faith, hope, and love’. And Ian gave a sermon talking about that. There’s a passage in the bible that talks about faith, hope, and love. ‘And the greatest of these is love’.”
“I’d been approaching religion as an intellectual exercise up until that point. But I had what I would call a religious experience there, and it quite overwhelmed me.”
Simon’s aunt Heather had greeted her warmly, and after the sermon, the other members of the church all came up to their group to say hello and chit-chat. Essentially, Erin had finally found that sense of ‘family’ that she craved, and she was desperate to hold onto it.
In 2006, Erin’s paternal grandmother passed away, and as a result, Erin inherited an amount of $2 million, which was to be distributed to her over the course of the next eight years. This inheritance allowed her more financial freedom, and she’d reportedly invest in several properties that she placed in both her and Simon’s names.
Erin and Simon got married in Korumburra in June 2007, but according to Erin, her parents had decided not to attend her wedding since they were on holiday in Russia at the time. Simon’s cousin David ended up having to walk her down the aisle, since she didn’t have anyone else to do it for her, and Simon’s entire extended family happily welcomed Erin into the family.
Erin and Simon eventually moved to Perth, and what is where their first child, a son, was born in 2009. Because it was their first child, Don and Gail offered to help them out, and they ended up moving in with them for a week. According to Erin, she’d suffered some complications following the birth of their son, and:
“I remember being really relieved that Gail was there because I felt really out of my depth. I had no idea what to do with a baby, and I was not confident. She was really supportive and gentle and patient with me.”
“She gave me good advice about just relax and enjoy it. You don’t have to stick to this timetable, this schedule. Just relax and enjoy your baby.”
When their son was two to 3 months old, Simon and Erin quit their jobs, bought a Nissan Patrol and went on an extended tour of Northern Australia. Erin would later explain that it was fun at first because her son would take 3-hour-long naps, and they had a lot of free time. But as the months went by, he needed more attention and didn’t sleep as much anymore, and they could no longer drive for extended periods.
Then, when their son was about 10 months old, he started crawling around and standing up against the furniture, and Erin claims that she soon started to grow tired of camping and constantly having to be on alert to ensure that he didn’t crawl off into the bush.
“I wanted to sleep in a real bed and it was getting harder to camp with our son.”
Her frustrations with their living arrangements resulted in her and Simon having frequent fights, which resulted in them agreeing to go their separate ways for a while. Erin ended up getting on a plane and flying back to Perth in November 2009. She’d left their son with Simon, and it reportedly took them a week to drive back. During that time, Erin rented a cottage for her and their son to live in, and initially, Simon lived in an on-site caravan nearby.
In January 2010, Simon moved back in, but this was just the first ‘break’ they had, and they’d repeatedly go their separate ways over the course of the next five years. Erin would later claim that she’d still loved Simon and hadn’t wanted to separate from him, but Simon would testify that:
“She always left me.”
During their marriage, they used Erin’s inheritance money to buy a house and also provided interest-free loans to Simon’s siblings so that they could purchase homes for themselves. It would later be speculated that this was another attempt by Erin to ingratiate herself with Simon’s family.
In 2014, Simon and Erin ended up moving to County Victoria so that they could be closer to Don and Gail, and towards the end of that year, Erin gave birth to their daughter. According to Erin, she was a fussy baby, and it took her some time to convince their doctors that there was something seriously wrong with their daughter. The baby was eventually diagnosed with ovarian cancer and had to undergo surgery, and the amount of stress they were under put a lot of stress on Simon and Erin’s relationship. Once again, they decided to go their separate ways in 2015, but this time, it would be permanent.
Erin became a stay-at-home mum and initially spent her days looking after their children. She did some part-time editing jobs for a local newspaper, but mostly spent her leisure time hanging out on the internet. Around 2018, she joined a true-crime Facebook group called ‘Keep Keli Lane Behind Bars’ that discussed the case of Keli Lane (a woman who’d been convicted of murdering her newborn baby back in the 90s), and Erin would end up befriending some of the other group members. She’d describe the group as being a ‘safe venting space’, and over the years, they became the only support system she had outside of the Pattersons.
Simon and Erin continued to co-parent, and according to Erin, she could admit to herself that they were better off as friends. Simon would join her and the kids on family holidays, and they’d regularly go camping together. But their relationship took a drastic turn towards the end of 2022, when Erin was notified by the Australian government’s Child Support Program that Simon would no longer be contributing to their children’s school fees and medical aid bills.
According to Simon, when his accountant submitted his tax return that year, he’d listed Simon’s marital status as ‘Separated’, and this triggered Services Australia to take a look at both his and Erin’s reported income. Using a formula, they determined that the asset-rich Erin was more than capable of supporting both their kids financially, so they informed Simon that he now only had to contribute $40 to their care.
This pissed Erin off, and she called Simon in a rage to tell him that she depended on his monthly payments to survive. When Simon told her that his accountant had made a mistake, that the decision had been made on a federal level and that they’d have to appeal the decision in court, she complained to Don and Gail and accused Simon of being a ‘deadbeat dad’.
Initially, Don and Gail tried their best to mediate and help Simon and Erin to reach an understanding, but Simon eventually informed his parents that he refused to pay Erin a penny more, and Don and Gail told Erin that there was nothing they could do. She then threatened to file for child support, but when her threats didn’t get the response she thought they would, she reportedly told some of her Facebook friends:
“Why isn’t [Gail] horrified her son is such a deadbeat that I had no choice but to claim?”
Over the course of the next year, Erin’s relationship with Simon and his family members took a turn, and Simon stopped inviting her to family get-togethers. She’d also later claim that her children didn’t like going over to Simon’s anyway, since he was always busy with church stuff and never made an effort to hang out with them. She’d complain to her friends that Simon was emotionally abusive and a ‘gaslighter’, and that the Pattersons were a “lost cause”.
Then, in May 2023, Simon sent Erin a message on Signal and asked if she was going to attend Gail’s 70th birthday party. Erin told him that she hadn’t been invited and that she had no interest in attending a party where her invitation had been an ‘afterthought’. Erin would later claim that the lunch invitation had been her attempt at repairing her relationship with Simon’s family, since they were the only family members she had left.
Which begs the question – why did she murder them?
Under Investigation: The Deadly Mushroom Lunch
For all intents and purposes, the investigation into the poisonings had begun long before Pastor Ian and Heather had set foot in Leongatha Hospital. That’s because, at that point, Erin Patterson had already made at least three different attempts on Simon’s life!
According to Simon, the first attempt on his life took place between the 16th and 17th of November 2021. He and Erin had planned to go camping with their kids, and the afternoon before they were due to leave, he’d met up with Erin at her house, and she asked him if he’d like some of the bolognese she’d made for dinner. She dished some up for him in a Tupperware container, and he ate the pasta that evening.
A few hours later, he started suffering from vomiting and diarrhoea, and he ended up going to the hospital. The doctors treated him for food poisoning, but couldn’t determine the cause, and he was discharged the next day.
The second attempt on his life took place between the 25th and 27th of May 2022 while he’d been on a camping trip with Erin and the kids. According to Simon:
“We had a chicken korma curry on the second night. While Erin was preparing food, I was getting the fire going, so I didn’t watch her prepare it.”
During the night, he started suffering from an upset stomach, and the next morning, he told Erin that he needed to go to the hospital. She was upset because she had to pack their campsite up on her own, but when he arrived at the hospital, the doctors couldn’t find out what had caused his upset stomach – after all, they’d shared the same meal the evening before, and Erin and the kids were fine.
Simon was discharged that same day, but his condition gradually got worse, and he was eventually admitted to the Monash Hospital in Melbourne. He ended up in a coma for 20 days, during which time the doctors realised that parts of his intestine were dying, and he had to undergo emergency surgery to remove the affected parts. Later, the doctors informed him that:
“They’d done a lot of tests. They hadn’t found the cause of what happened to me, but they seemed to have dealt with the symptoms effectively that there was a good chance I would make a full recovery.”
Simon had to spend several weeks in a rehabilitation centre, and afterwards, he went to live with Erin and the kids while he recovered. But during this time, Erin made him feel like he was unwelcome and complained that he wasn’t pulling his weight as a parent.
“One morning she came in while I was in bed and she told me that she was very upset with me, that I spent a lot of my time in bed, that I did not help out around the home like she would like me to, that I didn’t get up early to bring the kids to school at all.”
The third attempt on Simon’s life took place on the 6th of September 2022. Again, he’d been camping with Erin and the kids, and Erin had informed him that she’d bring the food. That evening, she handed each one of them a vegetable wrap, but according to Simon, his was the only one that had been wrapped up in aluminium foil.
That evening, he started suffering from stomach cramps, and he ended up going to the hospital to get treated. Shortly after arriving, he reportedly passed out, had slurred speech, and the doctors suspected that he was having seizures.
Simon recovered, and early in 2023, he went to see one of his friends from church, Doctor Christopher Ford. He told Dr Ford that he’d been having some stomach trouble and that he’d had at least three near-death experiences in the past year. According to Dr Ford, none of Simon’s symptoms indicated that he was suffering from some kind of gastrointestinal disease or illness, so he suggested that Simon should draw up a list of everything he’d done and eaten before he fell ill.
“I asked him to do that because I couldn’t understand why … these things kept on happening to him in such a way that he had essentially almost had three near-death experiences. It didn’t fit into any of my medical models that would account for all three of those things.”
On the 21st of February 2023, Simon made another appointment with Dr Ford and told him that he suspected that Erin was poisoning him. He also sent Dr Ford a cookie and asked him to have it tested. According to Simon, his daughter had given him the cookies as a gift, but Erin kept on asking him if he’d eaten any of them yet, so he suspected that she’d somehow tampered with them. As far as we know, Dr Ford never had these cookies tested.
By March 2023, Simon started avoiding Erin whenever possible, and their relationship soured even further. But he also started making plans just in case he wasn’t able to avoid her, and she managed to do him some actual harm. He also informed his father, Don, that he was pretty sure that Erin was trying to kill him, and had Don appointed as his ‘Medical Treatment Decision Maker’ (aka, his medical proxy).
According to Dr Ford, he’d been in the middle of a discussion with Simon after church one morning when Erin came up to them and invited Simon to lunch. Simon agreed to go, but after Erin left, Simon reassured Dr Ford that – “he will politely decline her invite” – which he ended up doing the morning before the lunch was due to take place.
Simon would later testify that it had never occurred to him that she’d poison his parents, so he didn’t think to warn them not to go.
But obviously, Don knew what Erin had been up to, so when he and Gail started feeling sick, he took a glass jar and collected some of his vomit, just in case the doctors needed something to test for poison. He also called Simon to let him know that they were sick, and that they’d called an ambulance to take them to Dandenong Hospital. He then asked Simon to check up on Pastor Ian and Heather, prompting Simon to drive over to their house to see how they were doing.
After Simon had confirmed that Pastor Ian and Heather were also ill, Simon called Dr Ford to let him know that Erin might have poisoned four members of his family. Dr Ford then called Leongatha hospital just after 8 am on the 30th of July, and informed Dr Chris Webster that two critically ill patients were heading his way. He also told Dr Webster that he had cause to suspect that their patients had been deliberately poisoned by their host during lunch the previous day – they just didn’t know what kind of poison had been used.
Don and Gail were admitted to the Dandenong Hospital with suspected food poisoning, where Dr Beth Morgan took over their care. Initially, they both complained about nausea and diarrhoea, but Don explained that he also had some mild pain in his upper right abdomen. Dr Morgan and her staff had also been informed that they might have been deliberately poisoned, so they performed several blood tests on their patients to see if they could find out what could have caused their symptoms.
When the test results came back, they learned that Don’s blood acid levels were ten times higher than they were supposed to be, which meant that his body tissues weren’t receiving enough oxygen. Because this can be an indication that the person is suffering from organ failure, they performed a liver function test, and the results indicated that Don’s liver was sustaining damage.
When they’d ruled out all of the obvious medical causes of his liver failure, Dr Morgan called their toxicology department at around 10:30 pm, and Dr Mark Douglas informed her that Don’s symptoms indicated that he was most likely suffering from amanita poisoning, which is a result of ingesting death cap mushrooms.
They performed another series of tests, and when these tests confirmed their diagnoses, Dr Morgan then called Leongatha Hospital around 1 am on the 31st of July to inform Dr Webster that their patients had ingested death cap mushrooms, and Dr Morgan and her team started giving Don medication that was intended to protect his liver.
Gail’s blood acid levels were also rapidly increasing, so they transferred her to the ICU and started giving her the same medication at around 2 am. Just before 7 am that morning, they gave both Don and Gail a dose of Silibinin. Unfortunately, by this point, the toxin had already been in their bodies for just over 48 hours, and Silibinin is considered to be most effective if it’s given to the patient within the first 24 hours after they’d ingested death caps.
Back in Leongatha, Dr Webster and the other hospital staff were busy arranging a patient transfer for Pastor Ian and Heather when a bell started ringing in the urgent care centre at around 9:50 am. According to Dr Webster, the Leongatha Hospital is pretty small, so when a person arrives at the admissions desk, the admissions staff press the “Nurse Call” button to let the medical staff know that they have a new patient.
All of the nurses were occupied, so Dr Webster approached the window that separated Urgent Care from the waiting area. A woman was waiting there, and Dr Webster apologised for the delay and explained that they had two critically ill patients who were taking up all their resources. He then asked the woman to come through to Urgent Care and asked her what he could help her with.
She told him that she was suffering from gastroenteritis, and according to Dr Webster, that’s when “the penny dropped”. Realising that she might be the person who’d deliberately poisoned her lunch guests, Dr Webster asked her what her name was. When she confirmed that her name was indeed Erin Patterson, Dr Webster brought her into the urgent care centre and told her:
“There’s a concern of death cap mushroom poisoning. Where did you get the mushrooms?”
Multiple people would later confirm that Dr Chris Webster has a very loud voice, and Erin herself would testify that she’d been shocked by the forcefulness of the question. So, she told him that she’d bought the mushrooms at Woolworths.
Dr Webster would later say that he immediately knew that she was lying, and his initial thought was, “You fucking did it, didn’t you? You poisoned them,” but of course, he didn’t say that to Erin. Instead, Dr Webster ordered one of the nurses to admit Erin for possible amanita poisoning. Then he left to tend to his other patients, and Erin started to panic.
When Dr Webster tried to check up on her, he was informed that she’d claimed she had things to do at home before she could be admitted. So, she’d signed a form that said that she was knowingly discharging herself from the hospital, and then left the building at around 9:55 am.
According to Dr Webster, her response to his enquiries had been very telling. What’s more, she’d shown no concern for Pastor Ian and Heather, who were both lying on hospital beds just 20m away. By this point, she already knew that they were at the Leongatha hospital, but she didn’t ask about them or go over to them.
So, after he’d learned that she’d discharged herself, Dr Webster gathered Erin’s admissions file, secluded himself behind a desk, and then called the police. He’d later tell the hosts of the podcast “The Mushroom Trial: Say Grace”, that he’d been fully aware that the call would one day be played in court, so he’d wanted to make sure that he gave the police all the information they needed to start investigating the case.
Dr Webster told the police that he was concerned about a patient of his, and he wanted them to do a welfare check on her. He explained that she’d been one of five people who’d attended a lunch that Saturday, and that they now suspected that their patients had ingested some deadly mushrooms during the meal. He told the police that two of the lunch guests were now in the ICU, and the other two were in a critical condition. He told the police that Erin had presented herself to the hospital earlier that morning with symptoms of poisoning, but that she’d left the hospital shortly after he’d asked her where she got the mushrooms from.
The police promised to check up on her, and about an hour later, Erin walked back into the Urgent Care centre. Dr Webster was surprised to see her, and when the police called him back to let him know that they couldn’t find Erin, he told them that she’d since returned to the hospital – but while they were at her house, would they mind taking a look in her trash, to see if they could find any trace of the leftovers of that beef wellington? Because, according to Dr Webster:
“I know when the bins go out in Leongatha. So, either the dog ate it, [or] it was highly likely that there’d be some traces of it on the property.”
Erin gave the police permission to search her property over the phone, and they were indeed able to find a portion of beef wellington in the trash that hadn’t been touched. It was bagged and sent off to Dandenong Hospital before it eventually made its way to a forensic lab, where both the duxelles and the meat tested positive for amatoxins.
While Erin was going through her medical history with the nurses, she claimed that she’d started feeling sick not long after her lunch guests had gone home. She then spent most of the night going to the bathroom, and when she woke up that Sunday morning, she got a call from Simon, who wanted to know if she was planning on going to church. She told him that she was home and that her stomach was a bit upset, which is when he informed her that his parents and his aunt and uncle had been admitted to the hospital for food poisoning.
According to Erin, she’d started feeling better by Sunday evening, but she didn’t feel like making dinner. She told the medical staff that there was still some of Saturday’s lunch left over, so she reheated some of it and gave it to the kids. This included some of the beef wellington she’d prepared – but don’t worry. Because her kids don’t like mushrooms, she’d scraped the pastry and the mushroom duxelles off the meat before she fed it to her kids.
Her son would later claim that it was the best meat he’d ever had. He’d even offered to finish his mom’s portion for her.
Of course, when Dr Webster heard this, he grew concerned that her kids might also have been poisoned. When he insisted that they had to be tested for amanita poisoning, Erin refused and said that she didn’t want to scare them. According to Dr Webster, his response to her had been:
“Do you want them to be scared and alive, or dead?”
Simon was eventually called, and he picked their kids up from school before he brought them to the hospital. Both of the children confirmed that yes, they’d eaten some of the leftovers from the previous day’s lunch, but they felt fine. Simon, meanwhile, spoke to Erin and asked her how she was doing, and according to Erin, he asked her about the lunch and how she’d prepared the food.
She told him that she’d bought the meat and button mushrooms from Woolworths, and had prepared separate portions for each person. She’d cut up the mushrooms, and then rehydrated some other mushrooms she had in the pantry. She’d added those mushrooms to the mushrooms from Woolworths and then made her duxelles. When she did a taste test, it tasted quite bland, so she added some dehydrated wild mushrooms she had bought from an Asian grocer, because they tasted stronger than plain old button mushrooms.
According to Erin, when she mentioned the dehydrator, Simon had asked her:
“Is that what you’d used to poison my parents?”
Erin had denied it, but would later claim that after he’d taken the kids home, she’d thought about his words, and started wondering if maybe she had inadvertently poisoned his family members. However, Simon would later deny that this conversation had taken place at all.
Anyway, the medical staff performed a whole lot of blood tests on Erin while she was in the hospital, and all of her results came back normal. She was discharged on the morning of the 1st of August 2023, and on the 2nd of August, Erin switched her sim card out of her phone and reset it. She also took her dehydrator and various other items to a local dumpsite (or tip, as it’s called in Australia), and it has been speculated that she’d also dumped the plates she’d used to serve the beef wellington that Saturday.
That evening, Simon called a family meeting in the hospital’s chapel, and he told his siblings and cousins that he had reason to suspect that Erin had poisoned their parents, who by this point had all been intubated and placed in comas. According to his cousin Ruth:
“He wanted to tell us that he suspected his … illnesses had been a deliberate act, that he had stopped eating food that Erin had prepared. He suspected Erin had been messing with it; he was really sorry that he hadn’t told our family before this … but he thought he was the only person she was targeting, and that we would be safe.”
The next morning, Simon emailed his family members copies of his medical history and went to the local police station to open a case of attempted murder. He handed the police a copy of his medical history and told them about his suspicion that Erin had deliberately poisoned his family members.
But by that point, the police had already been investigating the case, because behind the scenes, a LOT had been going on.
Because Erin had originally claimed that she’d bought the mushrooms from Woolworths, but then claimed that she’d bought some dehydrated wild mushrooms from an Asian grocer, officials from the City of Monash’s Health Department were doing their best to find the source of the poisoned mushrooms and destroy whatever was left before more people fell ill.
Sally Ann Atkinson, the Health Department official who’d been in charge of the investigation, made numerous attempts to get information from Erin regarding where she might have bought the mushrooms from, but Erin was less than helpful. Erin claimed that she’d either bought them in Glen Waverley or Mount Waverley – which are two neighbouring suburbs in Melbourne – but she couldn’t remember which store she’d bought them from, on which street the store was located, or when exactly she’d bought them. As such, one of the Department of Health officials visited every Asian grocer he could find in those two neighbourhoods and took more than 300 photos of bags of dehydrated mushrooms in an attempt to identify the brand Erin had bought.
But then Heather and Gail passed away on the morning of the 4th of August 2023, and the Homicide Squad of the Victoria Police took over the investigation into the Leongatha poisonings. Erin was brought in for questioning on the afternoon of the 5th of August, and during her interview, she repeated her claims that she’d bought the mushrooms from a Woolworths and an Asian grocer.
When the police asked her if she’d ever foraged for mushrooms before, she’d denied it. When they asked her if she’d ever owned a food hydrator before, she denied it. When they informed her that they’d found a brand-new manual for a Sunbeam food dehydrator in her home, she claimed that she’d owned a lot of appliances over the years, and she always kept the manuals. When the police asked her why all of her lunch guests had become critically ill following the lunch, Erin told them:
“I’ve never been in a situation like this before, and I’ve been very, very helpful with the health department throughout the week because I wanted to help that side of things as much as possible, because I do want to know what happened.”
“So I’ve given them as much information as they’ve asked for and offered up all the food and all the information about where the food came from.”
By the time Erin was allowed to return home later that evening, the whole town was SWARMING with journalists. The story about the fatal Saturday Lunch was being reported on in Europe and the US, and shows like Under Investigation with Liz Hayes were already doing hour-long features on it.
For days, the media waited outside of Erin and Simon’s homes in the hope that they would be allowed to interview either one of them, and on the 8th of August, Erin granted their wish. She’d gone out to do some shopping, and when she returned to her house, she didn’t close the electronic gate behind her. The journalists descended on her like vultures, and when she got out of her car, she was already surrounded by cameras and journalists who all wanted to know where she’d gotten the mushrooms from.
In response, Erin drew herself up, stared up at a point over their heads, and started delivering a speech that she must have prepared beforehand. She explained that she was absolutely DEVASTATED by the loss of Gail, Heather and Ian, and reminded herself that Don was still in hospital (which wasn’t true, since Don had passed away that morning). She told the journalists that their deaths were a great blow to her and her family and the community, and especially the kids, who’d now lost their only grandparents.
She went on to explain how their deaths were a tragedy, that she’d loved them, and that all of them had only ever been good and kind to her. That whole time, though, Erin can be seen brushing away her non-existent tears, and then looking at her fingers to confirm that they were, in fact, still dry. When the journalists ignored her little statement and kept on asking her where she’d bought the mushrooms from, Erin took her shopping bags inside and locked herself in her home. After that, she kept the gate to her property unlocked, but her reactions to the press would become more and more hostile as time went on.
The media would continue to hound the community for information for the next few weeks, but eventually, things died down. That is, until the news broke on the 3rd of November 2023 that Erin Patterson had been arrested and charged with three counts of murder and five counts of attempted murder, which included the multiple attempts on Simon’s life.
The Many Lies of Erin Patterson
Erin Patterson’s pre-trial hearings occurred between the 21st of August 2024 and the 13th of February 2025. During these hearings, Justice Christopher Beale – and the press - heard the story of how Erin had made several attempts on Simon’s life, but, by the end of the hearings, it was decided that the prosecution wasn’t going to charge Erin with those four additional charges of attempted murder, since they didn’t have enough evidence to prove their case.
So, when her murder trial began on the 29th of April 2025, the jury was informed that Erin had only been charged with three murder charges and one charge of attempted murder. The witnesses were also informed that a suppression order had been put in place for the duration of the trial, so any evidence relating to her attempts on Simon’s life had to be excluded from their testimony.
Erin had hired Senior Counsel Colin Mandy to defend her case, and during his opening statement, he admitted that yes, Erin Patterson had fed her guests poison mushrooms, but it doesn’t mean that she’d tried to murder them.
“Did she intend to kill these four people? That’s the issue. Erin Patterson did not deliberately serve poisoned food to her guests. The defence case is that what happened was a tragedy and a terrible accident.”
During the trial, the court and the jury were told that Erin Patterson was a good and caring mother and that she had been very involved in her community. She wasn’t close with any of her blood relatives, so after she’d married Simon, the Pattersons became her new family. They also explained that after her and Simon’s separation, Don and Gail had reassured her that they’d always be there for her and the kids.
Erin herself took to the witness stand towards the end of the trial, and she told the court that she’d never had a good relationship with her own parents. Erin claimed that when she was little, her mother used to weigh her and force her to go on diets. This had severely impacted her self-esteem, and when she became a young adult, she started purging after meals in an attempt to lose weight.
Erin also claimed that she’d never been particularly interested in mushrooms, apart from taking photos of them when she came across some while out hiking with the kids. But during Lockdown, she – just like so many other people – had developed an interest in foraging. She started by researching the mushrooms that grew on her property, and she did a small taste test on each one to ensure that they were indeed safe to eat.
She’d add these mushrooms to pastas and sauces, and she grew to like the wild taste they had compared to store-bought mushrooms. She knew that her kids didn’t like eating mushrooms, so she hid them in their food and baked goods like brownies. She also liked to bulk-buy mushrooms, and whatever she didn’t use, she’d dehydrate and keep in a Tupperware container in her pantry.
Erin claimed that in the two years leading up to the lunch, she’d developed some health concerns that resulted in her gaining a lot of weight, and she went to see several doctors about it. She was concerned that she might be suffering from either heart disease or ovarian cancer, but when the biopsy she’d had done to confirm her diagnosis came back negative, Erin decided to undergo a gastric sleeve surgery to help her lose weight. She’d made an appointment to undergo the gastric sleeve surgery at the Enrich Clinic in Melbourne for September 2023, but had realised pretty early on that she’d need someone to help her look after the kids while she underwent the surgery and then recovered at home for six weeks.
According to Erin, she’d felt too ashamed to admit that she was going to undergo surgery to lose weight, so instead, she’d decided to tell Simon and his family that she’d been diagnosed with ovarian cancer.
She explained that she’d invited everyone over to the lunch to tell them the news, and had then spent a week preparing for the meal. The recipe she’d used specified that she needed a beef tenderloin, but when she went to Woolworths to buy the meat, they didn’t have a piece that was big enough. So, instead, she bought several packages of ribeye meat and decided to make separate portions of beef wellington instead.
Erin told the court that Simon had informed her that he wouldn’t be attending the lunch the day before. By then, she’d already purchased the ingredients, so she was disappointed, but Don, Gail and the others were still planning on coming over, and she spent most of Saturday morning preparing the lunch.
When her guests arrived, Heather had gifted her with a plate of fruit for dessert, and Gail had baked her an orange cake. They sat down for lunch at around 1 pm, and the guests left again just after 3 pm.
Erin claimed that after everyone had left, she’d cleaned up the dishes and her kitchen, and then decided to help herself to some of the orange cake. Then she had another slice, and another, and before long, she’d finished most of the cake and felt sick and disgusted with herself. She went to the bathroom and forced herself to vomit, and a short while later, she started experiencing the first signs of food poisoning.
Erin told the court that she had spent most of that night suffering from vomiting and diarrhoea, and on Sunday morning, she woke up feeling weak and exhausted. Simon called her at some point during the morning to ask her if she’d gone to church, and she informed him that she was feeling ill. Simon told her that his family members were in the hospital, and that they suspected it might be something they’d eaten the day before. Erin told him that she’d have herself checked out, and then hung up the phone.
Later that afternoon, Erin drove her son to his flying lessons despite the fact that she was feeling unwell. At some point during the hour-long trip, she had to pull over to poo in the bushes next to the road, because her stomach was still upset. She’d used some tissues to clean herself up afterwards, and then stopped at a convenience store to dump the used tissues in the bathroom. When they arrived at the flying school, her son’s instructor informed them that the weather was taking a turn and that their lesson was cancelled.
Erin and her son then got back into the car and drove back home.
That evening, Erin wasn’t feeling well enough to cook, so she decided to give her kids some of the leftovers from Saturday’s lunch. Once again, she testified that she’d scraped the pastry and mushroom duxelles off the pieces of meat since her kids don’t like mushrooms, but she’d barely touched her portion since she was still feeling nauseous.
On Monday morning, Erin dropped the kids off at school and then went to the Leongatha hospital for a saline drip, since she was feeling a little dehydrated. When she was confronted by Dr Webster, she’d been shocked by his brusqueness, and Erin explained that when she was told that she was going to be admitted for possible amanita poisoning, she’d insisted that she had to go home first. After all, she still had to pack her daughter’s ballet bag, and she had to feed her animals and make arrangements before she could be admitted to the hospital.
Erin claims that after she’d initially left the hospital, she’d gone home, packed her daughter’s bag, and had then taken a nap. She returned to the hospital at around 12 pm, and that evening, Simon asked her if she’d used her food dehydrator to poison his parents.
According to Erin, Simon’s claims caused her to think a bit about where she’d gotten all of her mushrooms from, and she realised that yes, there were some dried mushrooms in her pantry that she’d foraged for herself. When she came to the conclusion that she’d accidentally poisoned Don, Gail, Heather and Ian, she panicked and started thinking about what measures she could take to hide the evidence of what she’d done.
Of course, the Crown disagreed with this explanation of events.
Crown Prosecutor Nanette Rogers led the prosecution, and she argued that Erin had deliberately poisoned Don, Gail, Heather and Ian. According to Rogers, Erin and Simon’s relationship started deteriorating after he’d been ordered to stop paying their kids’ school fees and medical bills, and when Don and Gail seemed to take Simon’s side against Erin, she felt betrayed by them and started plotting their murders.
Messages that Erin had sent to her friends on the ‘Keep Keli Lane Behind Bars’ Facebook group were presented to the court, and in these messages, she expressed her growing dislike of the Pattersons. Two of these messages read:
“This family I swear to fucking god”
And
“I’m sick of this shit, I want nothing to do with them … So fuck ‘em”
Nanette Rogers explained that in the two years leading up to the ‘fatal lunch’, Erin Patterson had been researching poisonous plants, mushrooms, and other poisons that have been used to murder people. Her internet search history, internet downloads, and the books in her home indicated that she’d researched hemlock, rat poison, and poisonous mushrooms during that time, and had kept track of the various kinds of poisonous flora that grew in and around the surrounding towns.
Her internet search history also indicated that she’d regularly visited a website called iNaturalist. The website is used by nature lovers all over the world to catalogue and record the locations of different animals, insects, and plants, and it enables scientists to track down and locate the different kinds of flora and fauna they’re studying. As of 2022, Erin had been using this website to keep track of the areas where death cap mushrooms had been spotted.
On the 18th of April 2023, Dr Christine McKenzie, a former poisons specialist, came across a patch of death cap mushrooms in the Lock Reserve and posted a warning to the iNaturalist site. The post included photos of the mushrooms, their location, and a reminder that they grew in clusters underneath oak trees. Dr McKenzie testified that she’d destroyed the mushrooms she had come across, but explained that it was likely that more could have grown over the coming days.
According to Erin’s cell phone data, she’d travelled to the Loch reserve on the 28th of April. Her phone was inactive for approximately half an hour before she was once again on the move. That afternoon, she purchased a food dehydrator. According to the prosecution, Erin knew that she didn’t have enough mushrooms to murder 5 people yet, so she needed to preserve the ones she did have until she had the opportunity to use them.
Erin then sent pictures of cut-up mushrooms to her friends on the ‘Keep Keli Lane Behind Bars’ Facebook group, and told them that the mushrooms lost 90% of their weight when dehydrated. Her need to weigh the mushrooms suggests that she was calculating how many mushrooms she still needed.
On the 21st of May, Dr Thomas May, a mycologist, came across another patch of death cap mushrooms in Neilson Street, Outtrim, and also posted a warning to the iNaturalist website. Just like Dr McKenzie’s post, his included the location and photos of the mushrooms. According to Erin’s cell phone data, she drove to Outtrim on the 22nd of May.
Erin then hosted a lunch at her home on the 24th of June. Don, Gail, and her children were present. Simon had declined and told her that he felt “too uncomfortable” to attend the lunch. Following this lunch, Erin told Gail that she’d had a biopsy done, but that:
”… there’s a bit to digest with everything that’s come out of it all, I might talk more about it with you both when I see you in person”.
Erin invited her victims over for lunch once again on the 16th of July 2023, told them that she had some important medical news to share with them, and that she didn’t want the kids to attend. When Simon declined her invitation a day before the lunch, she sent him a message which read:
“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.”
When Erin had planned the fatal lunch, she decided to make separate portions of beef wellington because this ensured that she knew exactly which pieces were safe to eat and which weren’t. This is also supported by the fact that Erin’s usual butcher is located right across the street from Woolworths, and yet he told the police that she didn’t even enquire after a topside steak in the week leading up to the fatal lunch.
The prosecution also speculated that Erin didn’t think her lunch guests would survive long enough to let others know what they’d been discussing that day. As proof, they referred to the fact that Erin had used a different coloured plate for her portion – something Heather had repeatedly mentioned after she fell ill, and which Pastor Ian confirmed when he took the stand to testify against Erin.
In her closing argument, Nanette Rogers told the jury that Erin’s whole case relied on her version of what had happened that day, but that everything she’d told them was a lie. Nanette then presented a timeline to the court to prove that Erin had lied about ingesting death cap mushrooms herself:
On the afternoon of the 29th of July, Erin and her guests ate lunch at around 1 pm. They left at around 3 pm, and Erin claims that she started feeling nauseous soon after. Meanwhile, Pastor Ian and Heather attended a church meeting, and only started feeling ill between 11 pm and midnight that night – a good 11 hours after they’d consumed the toxic mushroom duxelles.
At around 8 am the next morning, Don, Gail, Heather and Ian are rushed to the hospital, and the doctors start treating them for food poisoning. By 2 pm, Don’s condition starts to worsen, and the doctors realise that his liver is failing. Around that same time, Erin is taking her son to his flying lessons.
She claims that she had pulled over to take a bush poo at some point during the 2-hour-long trip because she was suffering from diarrhoea, but her son told the police that this never happened. CCTV footage also shows that she’d stopped at a Subway on her way back to Leongatha, and more than one person pointed out that she’d been wearing white pants during that trip.
By that evening, Don is admitted to the hospital with multiple organ and kidney failure, and during the early hours of the 31st of July, the doctors start treating their patients for amanita poisoning. Erin arrives at the hospital just before 10 am, leaves again, and returns shortly after 12. According to her cell phone data, she’d driven to Outtrim and then spent some time there before she returned to the hospital.
It’s been suggested that she’d gone looking for more mushrooms in an attempt to poison herself, but they were out of season. Erin was tested for amanita poisoning after she returned to the hospital, but her results came back clear.
On the 1st of August, Erin is discharged from the hospital, but Don and Gail have to be put on life support. Don’s liver is rapidly failing, and the doctors decide to do a liver transplant. On the 2nd of August, Erin disposed of the food dehydrator at the local dump and reset her phone to hide evidence of her crime. The police would later find death cap spores inside the dehydrator, as well as a death cap-laced portion that had been meant for Simon on Erin’s property.
On the 4th of August, Heather and Gail passed away. Don followed on the 5th. Ian only started showing signs of improvement by that evening. Meanwhile, Erin is going about her life as usual, and the media has footage of her leaving her house to drop her kids off at school and returning home carrying several shopping bags.
Then, when the police started their investigation, Erin had lied about where she’d gotten the mushrooms from and claimed that she couldn’t remember where or when she had bought them. Not only did this mean that officials from the Department of Health then wasted several DAYS looking for the source of the mushrooms, but her decision to lie also meant that Don, Gail, and Heather didn’t receive the antidote for amanita poisoning within the crucial 24-hour window.
Nanette Rogers then summarised her closing arguments by presenting the Four Deceptions that were key to Erin’s crimes:
Erin had lied about having ovarian cancer to lure her victims to her house.
Erin had lied about where she’d sourced the mushrooms from.
Erin had lied about undergoing gastric sleeve surgery, and
Erin had lied about suffering from amanita poisoning.
Then Rogers told the court that during the trial, there had been a 5th Deception – Erin herself.
During her time in the witness stand, Erin had made a pretty good argument for the case that the poisoning had been accidental, and her version of events sounded reasonable. But Rogers pointed out that Erin had made three mistakes during her time in the witness stand, which proved that she’d been lying all along.
While Nanette Rogers had been cross-examining her, Erin was confrontational and repeatedly corrected Nanette whenever she could. In particular, about the day on which she’d bought the food dehydrator, which was the 28th of April 2023. Nanette had told the court that it had been a Monday, but Erin then corrected her and argued that it had actually been a Friday.
Nanette also pointed out that Erin had told the police and officials from the Department of Health that the Asian grocer where she’d bought the mushrooms from was located somewhere in either Glen Waverley or Mount Waverley – she just didn’t know where exactly. And yet, Erin had testified that she and Simon had lived in Glen Waverley for several years, and that she still visited the area at least once a month.
And then, when Nanette had been questioning Erin about her gastric sleeve surgery, Erin had claimed that she’d made an appointment at the Enrich Clinic in Melbourne for September 2023. But the Enrich clinic only provides dermatological services – not gastric sleeve surgery.
And just like that, Erin’s story fell apart.
On the 7th of July 2025, the jury found that Erin Patterson was guilty of three counts of murder and one count of attempted murder. On the 8th of September, Justice Christopher Beale read out his sentence, and he told Erin that:
“Your offending, which resulted in the death of three people and near death of another, involved substantial premeditation. I am satisfied that by 16 July 2023, when you unusually invited Simon, his parents and his aunt and uncle to a lunch without the children to discuss your non-existent medical issues, you did so with the intention of killing them all.”
Justice Beale told the court that Erin had done her research, so she knew exactly what kind of suffering she would inflict on her victims. Yet she watched on as they ate the poisoned beef wellingtons, and when the news reached her that they were in critical condition in the hospital, she didn’t show any concern for their well-being.
“Having regard to the aggravating circumstances of your offending, and the victim impact statements, I have no hesitation in finding that your offending falls into the worst category for the offences of murder and attempted murder.”
Erin received four life sentences for the murder of Don, Gail, and Heather, and 25 years for the attempted murder of Ian Parkinson. Justice Beale declared that all of her sentences were to be run concurrently, with the option of parole after 33 years. But, he explained, that’s only because of the horrible conditions that she’s experiencing in prison. And I gotta say:
Karma is a BITCH
You see, little ol’ Erin is what is considered a “major offender”, which resulted in her being kept in a maximum-security prison. She’s also notorious, so for her own safety, the prison authorities had thought it best to keep her locked up in solitary. She’s only allowed to socialise with one other prisoner, but she has to specifically ask to speak to her – which Erin never does.
She’s allowed to spend four hours outside of her cell, but due to staff shortages, this seldom happens, and at most, she spends an hour outside every day. And even then, this is only when the exercise yard is empty.
Her meals and medicine are provided through a flap in her door, and her only entertainment is a crochet needle and some wool. She can’t access the prison’s library when other people are present, and because of staff shortages at the prison, she’d only been able to visit the library four times in the 15 months between her arrest and her trial.
Unfortunately, none of this is intentional (since that would contravene international law), and according to the prison authorities, her extended stay in solitary confinement is solely due to the staff shortages and the amount of public attention she’d received. But I honestly felt a sense of schadenfreude when I heard how isolated Erin is in prison – especially after more than one of my sources mentioned that she’d always seemed like someone who’d craved to be a part of a loving family. Too bad then that she’d murdered the only people who seemed to give a shit about what happened to her.
However, I should note that Erin’s story isn’t quite over. As of the 3rd of November 2025, she’s been granted leave to appeal her sentence. The odds that she’ll succeed are incredibly slim, and she’s hired and fired at least three different barristers since deciding to appeal her case.
So, I guess that this isn’t the last we’ve heard of the Mushroom Lady.
Key Takeaways
- Erin Patterson poisoned four in-laws with death cap mushrooms in beef Wellington on July 29, 2023, killing three and leaving one in a coma.
- She used a fake ovarian cancer diagnosis to lure victims, served herself on a different colored plate, and lied about mushroom sources to investigators.
- Prosecution revealed Patterson had researched poisonous plants for two years, tracked death cap locations online, and purchased a dehydrator to preserve mushrooms.
- Simon Patterson had survived three prior suspected poisoning attempts by Erin and declined the fatal lunch, though he never warned his family.
- Patterson was convicted in July 2025 of three murders and one attempted murder, receiving concurrent life sentences with parole possible after 33 years.
Dana Ortiz covers prosecutorial mechanics, evidentiary procedure, and how investigations unwind decades after the original case file went cold.
Frequently Asked Questions
When did the fatal lunch take place and who were the guests?
The fatal lunch took place on the afternoon of July 29, 2023. The guests were 69-year-old Pastor Ian Wilkinson, his 66-year-old wife Heather Wilkinson, 70-year-old Gail Patterson, and her 70-year-old husband Don Patterson. Erin Patterson, their 48-year-old daughter-in-law, was the host.
What dish did Erin Patterson serve at the lunch and what was unusual about how it was served?
Erin Patterson served individual beef wellingtons. The unusual aspect was that Erin used a different colored plate for her own portion—a smaller ‘rusty brown’ or terracotta-colored plate—while her four guests were served on matching white or grey dinner plates.
What poison was found in the beef wellingtons and what are the three stages of its effects?
The beef wellingtons contained death cap mushrooms, which contain amatoxins. The three stages are: Stage 1 (Gastrointestinal phase, 6-24 hours after ingestion) with symptoms like nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea; Stage 2 (Latent Phase, 12-36 hours after ingestion) where victims may feel like they’re recovering while toxins spread through organs; and Stage 3 (Hepatorenal Phase, 3-6 days after ingestion) where liver and kidneys shut down, leading to jaundice, delirium, and death without intervention.
How many people died as a result of the poisoning and what was the outcome for the survivor?
Three people died: Gail Patterson and Heather Wilkinson passed away on the morning of August 4, 2023, and Don Patterson passed away on the evening of August 5, 2023. Pastor Ian Wilkinson was the sole survivor—he slowly showed signs of improvement by August 5, was discharged from ICU on August 21, moved to rehabilitation on September 11, and finally discharged from hospital on September 23, 2023, though he never fully recovered.
What were the ‘Four Deceptions’ that the prosecution identified as key to Erin Patterson’s crimes?
The Four Deceptions were: (1) Erin lied about having ovarian cancer to lure her victims to her house; (2) Erin lied about where she’d sourced the mushrooms from; (3) Erin lied about undergoing gastric sleeve surgery; and (4) Erin lied about suffering from amanita poisoning herself. Prosecutor Nanette Rogers also identified a ‘5th Deception’—Erin herself, as her entire testimony was deemed to be lies.
What evidence showed that Erin Patterson had researched death cap mushrooms before the fatal lunch?
Erin’s internet search history showed she had researched poisonous plants, mushrooms, and other poisons. She regularly visited iNaturalist, a website used to catalogue locations of flora and fauna, and had been tracking areas where death cap mushrooms were spotted since 2022. Her cell phone data showed she traveled to Loch Reserve on April 28, 2023 (where death caps had been found on April 18), and purchased a food dehydrator that same day. She also drove to Outtrim on May 22, 2023, where another death cap patch had been posted on May 21.
What was Erin Patterson’s sentence and what were the conditions of her imprisonment?
On July 7, 2025, Erin Patterson was found guilty of three counts of murder and one count of attempted murder. On September 8, 2025, Justice Christopher Beale sentenced her to four life sentences for the murders (running concurrently) plus 25 years for attempted murder, with the option of parole after 33 years. Due to being a ‘major offender’ and her notoriety, she was kept in maximum-security solitary confinement, allowed only one hour of exercise daily when the yard was empty, meals through a door flap, and minimal entertainment or library access due to staff shortages.
How did Erin Patterson’s relationship with Simon Patterson and his family deteriorate before the fatal lunch?
The relationship deteriorated after Simon was ordered to stop paying their children’s school fees and medical bills in late 2022, when Services Australia determined asset-rich Erin could support the children. Erin called Simon a ‘deadbeat dad’ and complained to Don and Gail. When they sided with Simon, Erin’s relationship with the family worsened. Simon stopped inviting her to family gatherings, and by May 2023, she claimed she hadn’t been invited to Gail’s 70th birthday party.
She told friends the Pattersons were a ‘lost cause’ and expressed wanting ‘nothing to do with them.‘
What attempts had allegedly been made on Simon Patterson’s life before the fatal lunch?
According to Simon, there were three prior attempts: (1) November 16-17, 2021—Erin gave him bolognese in a Tupperware container, after which he suffered vomiting and diarrhea requiring hospitalization; (2) May 25-27, 2022—during a camping trip, Erin prepared chicken korma curry while Simon wasn’t watching, after which he became ill, was hospitalized, fell into a 20-day coma, and needed emergency intestinal surgery; (3) September 6, 2022—Erin gave him a vegetable wrap in aluminum foil (while others’ wraps weren’t wrapped), after which he suffered stomach cramps, slurred speech, and suspected seizures at the hospital.
What critical mistake did Erin Patterson make when questioned by Dr. Chris Webster at the hospital?
When Dr. Webster asked Erin where she got the mushrooms, she claimed she bought them at Woolworths. Dr. Webster immediately knew she was lying because Woolworths does not sell death cap mushrooms. She then panicked, claimed she had things to do at home, signed a form discharging herself against medical advice, and left the hospital at around 9:55 am—showing no concern for Pastor Ian and Heather who were lying on hospital beds just 20 meters away. This behavior prompted Dr. Webster to call the police.
Sources
- Original Casual Criminalist video: The Mushroom Murders: When Erin Patterson Poisoned Her In-Laws with Beef Wellington
- Hero image source by Parkerman & Christie from San Diego, USA / openverse, by.
