Speaker 1: Justice Christopher Bill got into the thick of it today
Speaker 1: in his charge to the jury in the trial of
Speaker 1: Aaron Patterson. He took a magnifying glass to the evidence
Speaker 1: as he stepped through the testimony of more than a
Speaker 1: dozen witnesses, summarized the lawyer's arguments, and even instructed the
Speaker 1: jury to disregard two points made by the Crown. We'll
Speaker 1: talk about this and more of what he said in
Speaker 1: court today. I'm Brooke Greebert Craig, and this is the
Speaker 1: Mushroom Cook. We have just finished day thirty eight of
Speaker 1: Aaron Patterson's murder trial, and as always I'm joined by
Speaker 1: my colleague, court reporter Laura PLOSSELLA Hey, Brook, how are you.
Speaker 1: I'm good, Thanks, how.
Speaker 2: Are you not bad?
Speaker 1: Let's start now. The first thing that Justice Bill did
Speaker 1: this morning was give the jurors an update on the
Speaker 1: trial timeline.
Speaker 2: He's provided them with a few updates this week, but
Speaker 2: this one felt a lot more definitive. He told them
Speaker 2: that his charge would continue for the rest of today, Thursday,
Speaker 2: go into Tomorrow Friday, and then he would finally finish
Speaker 2: on Monday. By that stage, there'll be two jurors. He'll
Speaker 2: be balloted off. So right now, to remind our listeners,
Speaker 2: there are fourteen jurors. After we lost one earlier in
Speaker 2: the trial, two will be balloted off to leave us
Speaker 2: with the magic number of twelve, and then they'll start
Speaker 2: their deliberations. But once they're done for the day, they
Speaker 2: won't go home. They'll be busted to local accommodation to
Speaker 2: be sequestered, and then they'll return the next day to
Speaker 2: the Latrobe Valley Law Courts to continue deliberating.
Speaker 1: So this will all be taking place in week ten
Speaker 1: of the trial.
Speaker 2: Yes, and I really can't believe that at any stage
Speaker 2: we thought this would actually just go for five weeks.
Speaker 1: Crazy. So Justice Bill then returned to the topic of
Speaker 1: incriminating conduct today.
Speaker 2: He did so. We ran through the list yesterday of
Speaker 2: all of the alleged incriminating conduct that is being put
Speaker 2: forward by the prosecution. Justice Bill only got a chance
Speaker 2: yesterday to make his way through one of those points,
Speaker 2: and he spent the rest of the day making his
Speaker 2: way through the list. This involves a lot of summary.
Speaker 2: He is essentially summarizing up to seven weeks of evidence
Speaker 2: and then turning to summaries of the prosecution and the
Speaker 2: defense arguments. So today, when we make our way through
Speaker 2: it ourselves, a lot of this will probably sound familiar
Speaker 2: to our listeners. But this is Justice Beale really preparing
Speaker 2: the jury for their deliberations. There is so much evidence
Speaker 2: in this case that the judge's charge involves these summations
Speaker 2: to make sure they're best placed when it is time
Speaker 2: to commence those important deliberations.
Speaker 1: So let's move to the first point. He began summarizing
Speaker 1: the evidence relating to Aaron allegedly lying about using dried
Speaker 1: mushrooms from an Asian grosser in the beef welling to
Speaker 1: mill that she cooked on July twenty nine, twenty twenty three.
Speaker 2: This was the point that Justice Beal spent the longest
Speaker 2: on today. I think he finished with this topic just
Speaker 2: before lunchtime, and the reason for this was he essentially
Speaker 2: had to go through the evidence of almost a dozen witnesses.
Speaker 2: There were a lot of people Erin spoke to in
Speaker 2: the days after the lunch about the source of the mushrooms.
Speaker 2: She was speaking to doctors at Lingatha Hospital. She was
Speaker 2: speaking to Senior Public Health Advisor Sally ane Atkinson, and
Speaker 2: speaking to child protection worker Katrina Cripps for the most part.
Speaker 2: All of these witnesses testified that Aaron told them she
Speaker 2: used button mushrooms from a local Woolworths and dried mushrooms
Speaker 2: from an Asian grocer, but she could not remember the
Speaker 2: exact location of that shop. Justice Bill also summarized the
Speaker 2: evidence from Erin and how she realized in the days
Speaker 2: after the lunch that mushrooms she had foraged and dehydrated
Speaker 2: may have ended up in a container with the dried
Speaker 2: mushrooms from the Asian grocer. This was the container, she
Speaker 2: said she grabbed and tipped into the mushroom duct cell,
Speaker 2: believing at the time that it only contained the dried
Speaker 2: mushrooms from the Asian grocer.
Speaker 1: Justice Build then outlined what the prosecution alleges. Here's what
Speaker 1: he said. It's his words, but not his voice.
Speaker 3: The prosecution argued. She sat on her hands, slow to
Speaker 3: respond to the Department of Health, not responsive at times
Speaker 3: giving evidence. She appeared to have a remarkable memory. She
Speaker 3: could remember the twenty eighth of April twenty twenty three
Speaker 3: was a Friday and not a Monday, but she couldn't
Speaker 3: recall the shop or even the suburb. Beggar's belief. He
Speaker 3: went on Most importantly, they argue, no one else got sick.
Speaker 3: Monash Council had no complaints. The department had no reports
Speaker 3: of people falling ill. And why would she dehydrate already
Speaker 3: dried mushrooms. She told you the dehydrated mushrooms weren't as crisp,
Speaker 3: so she whacked them into the dehydrator. They argued that
Speaker 3: was a ridiculous lie to keep the possibility that an
Speaker 3: Asian store was the source of death cap mushrooms.
Speaker 1: Justice Bill then told the jury that the defense claims
Speaker 1: the prosecution cherry picked their evidence.
Speaker 3: It was argued the prosecution ignored the nuances of human behavior.
Speaker 3: They argued, she was consistent with where the mushrooms came from.
Speaker 3: She had many conversations with many people, He went on.
Speaker 3: But things get recounted and it goes down the line.
Speaker 3: Big details get minimized, forgotten, altered. There were approximately twenty
Speaker 3: one people who spoke to Aaron Patterson in twenty four hours,
Speaker 3: and memory is not a video recording. Time plays a part.
Speaker 3: Delays can affect recollection of events. None of the witnesses,
Speaker 3: including Aaron Patterson, is immune. Recollection can be unreliable even
Speaker 3: when a person is trying to be honest.
Speaker 1: Justice Bill then moved on to summarize the evidence relating
Speaker 1: to Aaron allegedly lying about feeding her children the leftovers
Speaker 1: of the beef willing to mill with the mushrooms and
Speaker 1: pastry scraped off.
Speaker 2: Just like he did with the previous allegation. He took
Speaker 2: the jury to the evidence of sir witnesses. Here it
Speaker 2: was the evidence from Simon Patterson, Erin's estranged husband, and
Speaker 2: her two children. He also brought them back to her
Speaker 2: evidence as well. He said that Erin testified that she
Speaker 2: scraped off the mushrooms and pastry from the six beef
Speaker 2: wellington she prepared before serving the meat to her children
Speaker 2: with mashed potato and beans. He also reminded the jury
Speaker 2: that Erin said that the leftovers found in her outside
Speaker 2: bin comprised the scraped off mushrooms and pastry as well
Speaker 2: as the remainder of her beef wellington that she didn't
Speaker 2: eat at the lunch. Justice Bial then took the jury
Speaker 2: to the evidence of Erin's son, who told an investigator
Speaker 2: that his mum said to him and his sister that
Speaker 2: night that Don and Gale were unwell. He remembers his mum,
Speaker 2: saying to him that she thought the cause of the
Speaker 2: illness could have been the lunch, Justice Bill said.
Speaker 1: The prosecution argued that, considering the children did not experience
Speaker 1: any symptoms, her story about feeding them the leftovers must
Speaker 1: be a lie to cover her tracks. He also added
Speaker 1: that the prosecution had questioned why Aaron would feed the
Speaker 1: leftovers to her children when there was evidence to suggest
Speaker 1: she knew by that stage on July thirty, that Don
Speaker 1: and Gale were unwell.
Speaker 2: It was at this stage that Justice Biele actually told
Speaker 2: the jury to disregard two arguments made by Crown Prosecutor
Speaker 2: Nnette Rodgers in her closing address. The first argument related
Speaker 2: to the fact that doctor Rogers asserted that, even though
Speaker 2: they were scraped off, the toxins from the death caps
Speaker 2: would have penetrated the meat that Aaron served her children.
Speaker 3: Doctor Rogers overstated what the evidence was, So you disregard
Speaker 3: that argument that the amatoxins penetrated the meat. It's not
Speaker 3: necessarily so, Justice Beale said.
Speaker 2: The second argument related to the fact that doctor Rogers
Speaker 2: asserted that the children would have experienced symptoms if they
Speaker 2: had eaten the leftovers of the six beef Wellington, but
Speaker 2: he told the jury no expert witness was asked whether
Speaker 2: they would have expected the children to have experienced these
Speaker 2: symptoms after eating the meat with the mushrooms and pastry
Speaker 2: scraped off.
Speaker 3: You have no expert evidence as to whether that would
Speaker 3: be the case, and so I direct you to disregard
Speaker 3: the argument. You would be speculating if you would go
Speaker 3: down that path.
Speaker 1: Justice Bill said. The defense argued that if Aaron knew
Speaker 1: there were death caps in the meal, why would she
Speaker 1: tell people leftovers existed at all? The defense said it
Speaker 1: made no sense on the prosecution case that Aaron discarded
Speaker 1: the meat of the six beef Wellington and put the
Speaker 1: rest in her outside bin.
Speaker 3: Why get rid of meat but keep the mushroom, paste
Speaker 3: and pastry? Why put the pastry in the binners a
Speaker 3: deliberate ruse. The simple explanation is the much more likely explanation,
Speaker 3: She scraped off the paste and fed the meat to
Speaker 3: her children.
Speaker 1: Justice Bill then summarized the evidence relating to Aarin allegedly
Speaker 1: refusing to obtain treatment for her children.
Speaker 2: He took the jury to the evidence of witnesses from
Speaker 2: lean Gatha Hospital, including doctor Veronica Foote and nurse Carlie Ashton,
Speaker 2: as well as the evidence of Erin. Once again, he said,
Speaker 2: the prosecution argued that Erin was reluctant to have her
Speaker 2: children assessed because she knew that they had not consumed
Speaker 2: death cat mushrooms. But on the other hand, he said,
Speaker 2: the defense argued that Miss Ashton was wrong when she
Speaker 2: said she found out that Erin's children had consumed the
Speaker 2: leftovers on her first presentation to the hospital. He said.
Speaker 2: The defense claimed that her memory of this was inconsistent
Speaker 2: with the evidence of her colleagues, who said that they
Speaker 2: found out that Erin's children had eaten the leftovers when
Speaker 2: Erin returned to hospital later that morning. On July thirty one,
Speaker 2: Justice Bill said the defense argued that when Erin returned
Speaker 2: to hospital and was told that the toxins could have
Speaker 2: penetrated the meat and that her children might be in danger,
Speaker 2: that she made arrangements for them to be brought to
Speaker 2: hospital straightaway.
Speaker 1: Justice Bell moved on to some the evidence relating to
Speaker 1: Erin discarding her dehydrator at Kunwarra Tip on August two.
Speaker 2: It is worth noting that Erin has admitted to dumping
Speaker 2: her dehydrata, so this isn't alleged conduct, but the defense
Speaker 2: argued that it shouldn't be used as incriminating conduct. Justice
Speaker 2: Bell reminded the jury that Aaron testified that she panicked
Speaker 2: after she said Simon accused her of poisoning his parents
Speaker 2: with the dehydrater. Eron told the jury she was scared
Speaker 2: she would be blamed for making everyone sick, and so
Speaker 2: she took her dehydrata to the tip you mentioned brook
Speaker 2: and dumped it there. Justice Bill brought the jury back
Speaker 2: to the four deceptions alleged by the prosecution in its
Speaker 2: closing address, including the sustained cover up, which did involve
Speaker 2: erin getting rid of the appliance, he said. The prosecution argued, though,
Speaker 2: that the panic Erin said she was experiencing did not
Speaker 2: explain the extensive and prolonged cover up she ended up
Speaker 2: embarking on.
Speaker 1: But on the other hand, Bill said, the defense argued
Speaker 1: that if Aaron was planning a murder, she would have
Speaker 1: disposed of the dehydrator much earlier.
Speaker 3: She disposed of it when she did, Mister Mandy argued
Speaker 3: because she panicked and people would wrongly think that she
Speaker 3: poisoned them poisoned the lunch guests deliberately.
Speaker 1: Justice Bill then turned to the evidence relating to Aarin
Speaker 1: resetting Phone B multiple times, providing police phone B instead
Speaker 1: of Phone A, and lying about her phone number ending
Speaker 1: in eight three five. During her record of interview.
Speaker 2: He reminded the jury that the prosecution alleged that Aaron
Speaker 2: concealed Phone A, her usual phone, from police during a
Speaker 2: search of her house, and instead handed over Phone B,
Speaker 2: a dummy phone which she factory reset multiple times. He said,
Speaker 2: the prosecution argued that Erin concealed Phone A because she
Speaker 2: knew it would implicate her in the deliberate poisoning of
Speaker 2: her guests, but alternatively, he said, the defense argued that
Speaker 2: Aaron would not have gone to the trouble of setting
Speaker 2: up Phone B as a dummy phone, since it would
Speaker 2: have been much easier for her to factory reset Phone
Speaker 2: A and simply discard it straight after the lunch.
Speaker 1: Justice Bill added that Aaron testified that Phone A was
Speaker 1: not seized during the search and was left on a
Speaker 1: window sill untouched by police. She also testified that she
Speaker 1: set up phone B because Phone A was damaged and
Speaker 1: she wanted to change phone numbers after Simon accused her
Speaker 1: of poisoning his parents.
Speaker 2: Referring to Erin's testimony, Justice Bill said that the defense
Speaker 2: argued that the prosecution was coming up with convoluted theories
Speaker 2: for why there was an absence of evidence, and the
Speaker 2: explanations that Erin provided were the most reasonable.
Speaker 1: And with that, Justiceville told the jury he will continue
Speaker 1: to summarize the remainder of the alleged incriminating conduct tomorrow.
Speaker 2: And then he'll move on with the rest of his charge.
Speaker 1: Thanks Laura, see you then
Speaker 3: Four