Speaker 1: He was sedated and intubated. That's correct, yes, So in
Speaker 1: an induced coma.
Speaker 2: He was on a breathing machine, so on life support
Speaker 2: ventilation with the tube bown into his windpipe through his
Speaker 2: mouth and receiving medication to assist his comfort. During that time.
Speaker 3: It was a cold morning in more Well today and
Speaker 3: inside the La Troe Valley Law Courts, Crown Prosecutor Sarah
Speaker 3: Lenthal asked an intensive care doctor about the condition of
Speaker 3: the guests at that deadly mushroom lunch.
Speaker 1: Now we have been discussing his treatment on thirty one July.
Speaker 1: How is Donald Patterson's condition? By the next day, one August.
Speaker 2: He continued to deteriorate despite very aggressive treatment. Really, the
Speaker 2: measures that we were observing, both clinically and on investigations,
Speaker 2: we're moving in the wrong direction. We were very, very worried
Speaker 2: about his progress. He was getting worse.
Speaker 3: A week that had been about technical evidence ended on
Speaker 3: a human note, and there to hear it. Sitting quietly
Speaker 3: in court was Ian Wilkinson, the guest who lost his
Speaker 3: wife to deathcap mushroom poisoning. I'm Brooke greebt Craig, and
Speaker 3: this is the mushroom cook It's the end of week
Speaker 3: four of Aaron Patterson's murder trial, and once again I'm
Speaker 3: joined by my colleague, court reporter Laura PLASSELLA.
Speaker 4: Happy as always to be here with you, Brooke, but
Speaker 4: it seems like our makeshift podcast studio is unhappy with us.
Speaker 4: We're having a technical difficulty or two today, but we're
Speaker 4: soldiering on, Yes we are.
Speaker 3: We had a super short day in court today. We
Speaker 3: only heard from one witness and that was doctor Stephen Warrelowe,
Speaker 3: whose words you heard at the top of the episode.
Speaker 3: He's an intensive care specialist at the Austin Hospital in Melbourne,
Speaker 3: and he told the jury that he treated don Gale Patterson,
Speaker 3: and Gail's sister Heather and her husband Ian Wilkinson while
Speaker 3: they were in hospital in the days after that deadly lunch.
Speaker 4: And as you already mentioned, brook Ian was sitting in
Speaker 4: court today listening to this evidence, and this was evidence
Speaker 4: about the final days of his wife's life and also
Speaker 4: evidence about how he battled to survive and ultimately recovered
Speaker 4: from toxic mushroom poisoning. After giving evidence in the second
Speaker 4: week of the trial, Ian has actually been sitting in
Speaker 4: court most days and he's been surrounded by other family members.
Speaker 4: So the doctor first gave evidence about Don, so let's
Speaker 4: begin with him. Sounds like a plan. Doctor Warlow told
Speaker 4: the jury that both Don and Gail arrived at the
Speaker 4: Austin Hospital on July thirty one after they were treated
Speaker 4: at Dandy Nong Hospital. He said after Don arrived, he
Speaker 4: had been diagnosed with acute liver failure and was pretty
Speaker 4: quickly sedated and intubated. The Austin Hospital is the state's
Speaker 4: liver transplant service. He said that was the reason why
Speaker 4: all of these guests came to the hospital because they
Speaker 4: were in the best place to receive treatment relating to
Speaker 4: the liver. The doctors considered the cause of his liver
Speaker 4: failure as well as the other guests to be Amanita
Speaker 4: mushroom poisoning, so this is essentially toxic mushroom poisoning. But
Speaker 4: doctor Warrelo said that investigations still needed to be made
Speaker 4: to rule out any other possible causes. He said this
Speaker 4: involved blood tests, imaging, ultrasounds, and even some tests for
Speaker 4: some specific viruses so they could just make sure there
Speaker 4: was no other cause for this liver failure.
Speaker 3: The jury heard that eventually Don had to undergo a
Speaker 3: liver transplant.
Speaker 4: Yes, that's right, doctor Warrelo said that despite intensive treatments,
Speaker 4: Don continued to deteriorate and that the only possibility of
Speaker 4: saving his life was through a liver transplant. Crown prosecutor said,
Speaker 4: O Lenthal, who you heard from at the top of
Speaker 4: the episode, asked doctor Warlow where the Don's condition improved
Speaker 4: after the liver transplant, but he replied no, he got
Speaker 4: relentlessly worse. He then told the court that doctors at
Speaker 4: the Austin Hospital had no other treatments to offer Don.
Speaker 3: He was dying and sadly, Don passed away on August five,
Speaker 3: exactly one week after the lunch. Now let's move on
Speaker 3: to Gail Patterson. What did the doctor say about her?
Speaker 4: So Gail arrived again alongside her husband on July thirty one,
Speaker 4: and he described how she was very critically ill when
Speaker 4: she was admitted by August two. He said her liver
Speaker 4: was essentially not working at all and she was in
Speaker 4: a state of advanced shock due to multiple organ failure.
Speaker 4: The court heard that the same sort of investigations that
Speaker 4: were undertaken for Don were also done for her, but
Speaker 4: the doctors again concluded that the cause of her organ
Speaker 4: failure was toxic mushroom poisoning.
Speaker 3: And Gail didn't undergo a liver transplant, did she No.
Speaker 4: Doctor Warrelo said that all of the specialists came together
Speaker 4: to have a conversation around the best course of treatment
Speaker 4: for Gail, but it was determined that she was too
Speaker 4: sick to undergo such a complex surgery.
Speaker 3: And that's something similar that happened to her sister, Heather Wilkinson, right,
Speaker 3: that's right. The sisters had a very similar decline while
Speaker 3: they were in the Austin hospital. Heather arrived one day
Speaker 3: after Gail on August one with her husband Ian, and
Speaker 3: doctor Warrelo said that by August two, she was also
Speaker 3: rapidly deteriorating. The court heard that the specialists treating Heather
Speaker 3: ultimately concluded that her condition was not survivable. She died
Speaker 3: on the same day as her sister, on August four,
Speaker 3: and that was one day before gone. Finally the doctor
Speaker 3: spoke about Ian.
Speaker 4: So after arriving at the Austin Hospital, doctor Warrelo said
Speaker 4: Ian was showing signs of advanced multiple organ failure just
Speaker 4: like the other guests. He was extremely unwell, he said,
Speaker 4: and something called a plasma exchange was commenced on August three.
Speaker 4: Ian was administered a raft of treatments. These included a
Speaker 4: drug called NAK which is to protect the liver, as
Speaker 4: well as activated charcoal and syllibin, which are targeted medications
Speaker 4: for people who are suffering from deathcap mushroom poisoning.
Speaker 3: But the court heard that Ian slowly started to improve.
Speaker 4: That's right, and it seemed like this was almost out
Speaker 4: of nowhere. On August four, he was still declining, but
Speaker 4: by the next day doctor Warrelo said that there was
Speaker 4: some slow and important improvement. He told the court that
Speaker 4: it was slow because Ian was coming from a situation
Speaker 4: of extreme critical illness.
Speaker 3: The jury heard that Ian was discharged from the ICU
Speaker 3: on August twenty one, and eventually he returned home in September.
Speaker 4: Miss Lenthal had one final question for doctor Warlow about Ian.
Speaker 4: These are their words, it's not their voices.
Speaker 1: How close did Ian Wilkinson come to dying?
Speaker 2: We thought he was going to die. He was very close.
Speaker 4: After Miss Lenthal asked doctor Warlow about all the lunch guests,
Speaker 4: there were some questions around amanita mushroom poisoning. Generally, the
Speaker 4: doctor walked the jury through the effects this poisoning has
Speaker 4: on the body and he said that towards the end
Speaker 4: it can be a relentlessly progressive and quite frightening rapid
Speaker 4: deterioration into multiple organ failure, were the body's different organ
Speaker 4: systems essentially shut down and the patient is at a
Speaker 4: very high risk of dying.
Speaker 3: After the doctor was done giving his evidence, Digital forensic
Speaker 3: Officer Sharman fox Henry made a quick return to the stand.
Speaker 3: That's right.
Speaker 4: It was a very very brief appearance by mister fox
Speaker 4: Henry and it was to complete his evidence. In chief.
Speaker 4: One of the other Crown prosecutors, Jane Warren, returned mister
Speaker 4: fox Henry to the topic. They were talking about, Yesda
Speaker 4: being one of the Samsung mobile phones that was seized
Speaker 4: by police during the search warrant on August five. Our
Speaker 4: listeners may remember that yesterday mister fox Henry confirmed that
Speaker 4: a number of factory resets were conducted on this device.
Speaker 4: I will just clarify at this point that the dates
Speaker 4: of the factory resets were February twelve, August two, August five,
Speaker 4: and August six of twenty twenty three. August five was
Speaker 4: the date of the search warrant, and August six was
Speaker 4: the following day after he was done.
Speaker 3: Justice Christopher Bill apologized to the jury. He said, sorry,
Speaker 3: it has been a bitsy kind of day, but you
Speaker 3: may think on a Friday it's not all bad news.
Speaker 4: Yes, the jury got a very early finish today, but
Speaker 4: they will be back on Monday to continue hearing evidence,
Speaker 4: and so will we. To stay up to date on
Speaker 4: all the latest on this case, go to the mushroomcook
Speaker 4: dot com dot au and stay tuned for our subscriber
Speaker 4: ever Sewed on Sunday with veteran crime reporter Anthony Dowsling