WEBVTT - Texts with an accused killer 0:00:02.240 --> 0:00:06.600 Nine podcasts. In this episode, a senior public health advisor 0:00:06.720 --> 0:00:10.520 is questioned about her communication with the accused killer as 0:00:10.520 --> 0:00:13.119 the health department tried to find the source of the 0:00:13.160 --> 0:00:16.240 death cap mushrooms, and we hear more from the digital 0:00:16.280 --> 0:00:17.160 forensics officer. 0:00:18.079 --> 0:00:22.560 Victoria's mushroom mystery, the mushroom lunch that claimed three lives. 0:00:22.360 --> 0:00:25.400 An Australian family's meal is now the center of a 0:00:25.440 --> 0:00:26.640 homicide investigation. 0:00:26.720 --> 0:00:30.120 For bizarre tragedy now grabbing global headlines. 0:00:29.640 --> 0:00:33.400 Aaron Patterson's alleged victims died after eating a family lunch 0:00:33.400 --> 0:00:35.000 she'd serve them at her home. 0:00:35.159 --> 0:00:38.800 I cannot think of another investigation that has generated this 0:00:38.960 --> 0:00:42.600 level of media and public interest. Four of the guests 0:00:42.640 --> 0:00:45.479 of that lunch were much loved members of this church. 0:00:45.880 --> 0:00:47.519 Only one will ever return. 0:00:47.640 --> 0:00:52.840 People are feeling very heavy with having lost such wonderful people. 0:00:53.000 --> 0:00:57.560 Today, Aaron Pattison remained here inside her home. She's continued 0:00:57.600 --> 0:01:02.840 to plead her innocence in a court room in Country Victoria, 0:01:03.000 --> 0:01:06.440 Aaron Patterson is on trial accused of using death cat 0:01:06.480 --> 0:01:09.880 mushrooms to kill. She's pleaded not guilty to murdering three 0:01:09.920 --> 0:01:12.120 of her former in laws and attempting to kill a 0:01:12.200 --> 0:01:15.840 fourth the town's church pastor. It's up to the jurors 0:01:15.840 --> 0:01:19.119 to decide what happened when Pattison's loved ones sat down 0:01:19.160 --> 0:01:23.000 to eat. The fifth week of this trial has begun 0:01:23.160 --> 0:01:26.920 in Morewell and there's been quite a few more witnesses 0:01:27.080 --> 0:01:29.440 giving evidence. But before we get to that, we want 0:01:29.480 --> 0:01:32.160 to firstly, and this was the same order that the 0:01:32.280 --> 0:01:35.240 jury saw. All of this is come back to Sharman 0:01:35.319 --> 0:01:35.880 Fox Henry. 0:01:35.959 --> 0:01:36.119 Yes. 0:01:36.240 --> 0:01:38.320 Now, if people have listened to our previous episodes, they 0:01:38.400 --> 0:01:43.360 might remember he's a senior digital forensics officer within attached 0:01:43.360 --> 0:01:46.160 to Victoria Police and the cyber Crime Squad. Now he's 0:01:46.240 --> 0:01:50.040 previously given his evidence in chief. He has returned on 0:01:50.120 --> 0:01:53.280 various days and there's been different witnesses in between his evidence. 0:01:53.320 --> 0:01:55.320 But for the start of the fifth week he was 0:01:55.360 --> 0:01:58.040 back on the stand to be cross examined by Colin Mandy, 0:01:58.160 --> 0:01:59.400 Aaron Patterson's barrister. 0:02:00.200 --> 0:02:03.520 Into court in a slightly oversized suit. He has quite 0:02:03.520 --> 0:02:07.880 a significant mustache and some big black glasses on his 0:02:07.920 --> 0:02:09.720 head and he made his way from the door which 0:02:09.720 --> 0:02:11.040 is on the right hand side, all the way over 0:02:11.080 --> 0:02:13.440 to the witness box on the left. And this was 0:02:14.680 --> 0:02:17.880 one in a list of days that he'd appeared in court. 0:02:17.960 --> 0:02:22.280 But during the evidence that we heard today, Colin Mandy 0:02:22.360 --> 0:02:26.560 sc was questioning fox Henry about his qualifications. Penny. He 0:02:26.680 --> 0:02:29.000 was asked a little bit about what he does now, 0:02:29.040 --> 0:02:30.680 but what he was doing back at the time of 0:02:30.720 --> 0:02:34.040 this investigation. So it was August twenty twenty three that 0:02:34.080 --> 0:02:37.440 he was working as a digital forensics officer when he 0:02:37.520 --> 0:02:40.040 was asked by members of the homicide squad to take 0:02:40.080 --> 0:02:43.520 copies of what was found on these electronic devices and 0:02:43.680 --> 0:02:46.480 take that copy and give that over to Victoria Police. 0:02:47.440 --> 0:02:51.120 But now he works as a senior digital forensic officer 0:02:51.240 --> 0:02:53.840 in the Cyber Crime Squad. It was explained to the 0:02:53.919 --> 0:02:56.680 jury that he's since undergone a lot of extra training. 0:02:56.680 --> 0:02:58.880 He's done a lot of other courses and things like that. 0:02:58.960 --> 0:03:04.920 Butly Colin Mandy's questioning was was trying to establish what 0:03:05.000 --> 0:03:07.320 qualifications he had at that time, and the way that 0:03:07.560 --> 0:03:10.120 Sharman fox Henry explained it was a lot of his 0:03:10.240 --> 0:03:14.400 training on the different systems that Victoria Police use at 0:03:14.400 --> 0:03:17.120 the time was peer based. He learned a lot of 0:03:17.160 --> 0:03:19.880 it from his colleagues. Well, he may not have undergone 0:03:19.880 --> 0:03:23.400 specific training with these specific companies, it was peer based 0:03:23.440 --> 0:03:26.760 and he essentially had learned what to do from his colleagues. 0:03:26.760 --> 0:03:29.120 And he's spoken through different parts of his evidence that 0:03:29.160 --> 0:03:32.120 he sort of had a qualification in sound initially and 0:03:32.160 --> 0:03:34.680 he'd then worked in audio visual and that was with 0:03:34.800 --> 0:03:38.120 Victoria Police as well. So while the court was told 0:03:38.200 --> 0:03:40.640 in this part of his cross examination and his re 0:03:40.680 --> 0:03:43.440 examination that he sort of started with the particular role 0:03:43.840 --> 0:03:46.200 with the cyber Crime Squad in sort of the June 0:03:46.280 --> 0:03:48.760 of twenty twenty three, so a couple of months before 0:03:48.800 --> 0:03:51.480 the August, that he had been working in a different, 0:03:51.640 --> 0:03:55.560 slightly different department, but doing some things that were still 0:03:55.600 --> 0:03:59.240 within that sort of information technology space. And he was 0:03:59.320 --> 0:04:01.920 taken through a number of different parts of his evidence 0:04:01.920 --> 0:04:04.520 and asked a lot of different questions by Colin Mandy 0:04:04.640 --> 0:04:07.880 sc and as part of one of them early on 0:04:07.960 --> 0:04:09.920 where he was being asked again about his training and 0:04:09.960 --> 0:04:12.520 who told him how and what to do and how 0:04:12.600 --> 0:04:15.040 is he being instructed, he was asked about when it 0:04:15.080 --> 0:04:18.200 came specifically to the computer that listeners will have heard 0:04:18.200 --> 0:04:21.479 about before that he extracted and he's given evidence that 0:04:21.520 --> 0:04:24.760 he extracted the data from for police and investigators to 0:04:25.040 --> 0:04:28.120 then go through how he sort of went about doing that, 0:04:28.160 --> 0:04:30.200 And there's a lot of different programs that are mentioned 0:04:30.240 --> 0:04:32.479 in this, but there was a specific question put to 0:04:32.560 --> 0:04:36.479 him by mister Mandy that essentially came to the answer 0:04:36.560 --> 0:04:40.320 of that he'd selected something that said select all as 0:04:40.400 --> 0:04:41.960 part of downloading this information. 0:04:42.240 --> 0:04:46.040 Yeah, he said that copying a device or the hard 0:04:46.120 --> 0:04:48.080 drive or hard drives of a device. We know in 0:04:48.080 --> 0:04:50.000 this case with his computer there was a number of 0:04:50.040 --> 0:04:52.440 hard drives on it, he said, was a plug in 0:04:52.480 --> 0:04:55.760 and press going process. So while these questions were being 0:04:56.960 --> 0:04:59.120 sent his way trying to figure out exactly what his 0:04:59.200 --> 0:05:01.920 qualifications are and how you actually do things, he was saying, well, no, 0:05:02.040 --> 0:05:03.440 these are the words that he was using was his 0:05:03.560 --> 0:05:07.880 plug in, pressco process, and that was how he would 0:05:07.960 --> 0:05:11.480 perform his job and transfer the material accurately. 0:05:10.960 --> 0:05:13.720 Across so that it could then be further looked at 0:05:13.720 --> 0:05:16.600 by investigators, and then the investigators can then tag that 0:05:16.800 --> 0:05:21.239 with different evidence tags we heard today and Fox Henry 0:05:21.320 --> 0:05:23.240 was asked, well, did you put those tags on yourself, 0:05:23.279 --> 0:05:25.640 and he said no, there is these tags that the 0:05:25.640 --> 0:05:27.159 police can put on themselves. 0:05:27.160 --> 0:05:30.440 And there was something like two million artifacts or files 0:05:30.480 --> 0:05:34.120 that were downloaded off this particular PC. But fox Henry 0:05:34.160 --> 0:05:38.080 explained that it was only sixty odd different files that 0:05:38.640 --> 0:05:41.359 essentially went to Victoria Police for them to have a 0:05:41.400 --> 0:05:42.080 further look at. 0:05:42.400 --> 0:05:45.400 And he's previously explained in his evidence using this word artifacts, 0:05:45.480 --> 0:05:48.839 not perhaps in the way that people might commonly think 0:05:48.880 --> 0:05:51.320 of that word, but artifacts sort of being types of 0:05:51.400 --> 0:05:55.080 data and URLs and different things that can be looked 0:05:55.120 --> 0:05:58.520 at singularly or individually from these devices. Now we've heard 0:05:58.520 --> 0:06:02.360 about a number of other devices through mister fox Henry's evidence, 0:06:02.400 --> 0:06:05.479 and two of those are a tablet that police say 0:06:05.560 --> 0:06:08.599 was sees from Aaron Patterson's home, and the other is 0:06:08.600 --> 0:06:11.000 a phone that's been referred to it's a Samsung mobile 0:06:11.000 --> 0:06:14.159 phone as Phone B And previously the prosecutor has given 0:06:14.160 --> 0:06:17.599 evidence that the court will hear some evidence that that 0:06:17.800 --> 0:06:21.360 handset was given to police by the accused woman by 0:06:21.440 --> 0:06:25.719 Aaron Patterson. Now, going back to those two devices, neither 0:06:25.760 --> 0:06:30.320 of those were examined by this particular witness by fox Henry. 0:06:30.560 --> 0:06:33.800 He's told the court they're examined by another member sort 0:06:33.800 --> 0:06:35.880 of of the team. But he was asked quite a 0:06:35.920 --> 0:06:39.480 lot of questions about these by mister Mandy, and one 0:06:39.480 --> 0:06:42.480 of those the tablet and the photos that were contained 0:06:42.480 --> 0:06:46.080 on the tablet. He was asked basically, could was there 0:06:46.080 --> 0:06:48.760 any way of knowing exactly what device had taken a photo, 0:06:48.800 --> 0:06:50.800 if it was a phone, how it had ended up 0:06:50.839 --> 0:06:53.919 on something, or could they potentially have been sent to 0:06:54.040 --> 0:06:56.200 a device and ended up on a device from someone 0:06:56.240 --> 0:06:59.680 downloading a picture from the Internet or from a Facebook message. 0:07:00.000 --> 0:07:02.120 At this point, Penny that I actually missed hearing a 0:07:02.160 --> 0:07:05.920 little bit of Fox Henry's evidence because something had just 0:07:06.000 --> 0:07:09.640 happened after the mid morning break, and we were all 0:07:09.720 --> 0:07:11.840 a little bit distracted, I think in the court room 0:07:11.880 --> 0:07:14.320 for a little bit of time. We know that the 0:07:14.320 --> 0:07:17.800 mid morning break usually happens about eleven thirty am, about 0:07:17.800 --> 0:07:19.320 a fifteen minute break. 0:07:19.040 --> 0:07:21.680 And that's given by the judge and it happens in 0:07:21.720 --> 0:07:23.600 most trials as well. He's set this out with the 0:07:23.680 --> 0:07:26.000 jury from the start that they get a break in 0:07:26.040 --> 0:07:28.520 the morning and in the afternoon, sometimes more because they're 0:07:28.520 --> 0:07:30.840 listening to so much information so that they can just 0:07:30.920 --> 0:07:32.880 have a moment sort of a fifteen minutes or so, 0:07:32.960 --> 0:07:34.680 like you said, and then they can come back in 0:07:34.800 --> 0:07:37.000 refreshed and keep listening for another hour or so. 0:07:37.160 --> 0:07:39.000 But just as the jury sat back down and Fox 0:07:39.040 --> 0:07:41.760 Henry went to take his position in the witness box. 0:07:42.000 --> 0:07:43.960 There was a gentleman in the back row, a protester 0:07:44.080 --> 0:07:46.760 that stood up. He had a yellow T shirt on 0:07:46.840 --> 0:07:50.400 with writing on it, and he fixed his gaze on 0:07:50.480 --> 0:07:54.640 the judge and said, your honor or judge, accusing him 0:07:54.680 --> 0:07:57.440 of covering up murders and a like. And we couldn't 0:07:57.440 --> 0:07:59.120 hear exactly all the words that he was saying, but 0:07:59.160 --> 0:08:01.320 this was set in front of jury Penny and this 0:08:01.440 --> 0:08:03.960 gentleman he also had a blazer on, like a suit 0:08:04.040 --> 0:08:06.480 jacket over the top of this yellow shirt, and he 0:08:06.560 --> 0:08:08.720 was sitting in the back row next to five or 0:08:08.720 --> 0:08:11.240 six different members of the press. But this is also 0:08:11.360 --> 0:08:14.800 less than five meters away from the accused woman herself. Yeah, 0:08:14.840 --> 0:08:17.800 but very very quickly, this didn't last very long. The 0:08:17.840 --> 0:08:20.880 tip staff and a police officer quickly escorted this man 0:08:21.000 --> 0:08:23.680 from the room, and the judge said to the bar table, 0:08:23.680 --> 0:08:25.160 all right, let's just continue. 0:08:25.240 --> 0:08:28.320 And it did really continue quite rapidly after that, this 0:08:28.400 --> 0:08:31.240 evidence mister fox Henry sort of continuing what he'd been 0:08:31.360 --> 0:08:36.400 saying and what he spoke about with Colin Mandy. He 0:08:36.679 --> 0:08:39.440 sort of said, yes, well, there isn't an exact way 0:08:39.520 --> 0:08:42.840 necessarily to know you could have downloaded something from a 0:08:42.880 --> 0:08:45.440 chat or something if you've got if you were already 0:08:45.520 --> 0:08:48.120 viewing it through the app Google Photos, which is already 0:08:48.120 --> 0:08:50.800 spoken about through part of his evidence. So that was 0:08:50.840 --> 0:08:53.600 mentioned to him and he agreed with the defense there. 0:08:53.600 --> 0:08:56.400 But then there was this other device, Phone B was 0:08:56.440 --> 0:08:58.920 brought up again too, and mister Mandy asked him a 0:08:59.000 --> 0:09:02.040 number of dis frenk questions regarding how do you know 0:09:02.160 --> 0:09:06.319 exactly how a time and date and those settings are 0:09:06.320 --> 0:09:09.960 set on a particular phone. He's spoken about previously in 0:09:10.000 --> 0:09:12.719 his evidence that this phone, when he looked at the 0:09:12.800 --> 0:09:15.000 data that had been extracted and when he was explaining 0:09:15.000 --> 0:09:17.120 it to the jury, that there were four times that 0:09:17.160 --> 0:09:20.960 this phone has been factory reset, And he explained through 0:09:21.000 --> 0:09:24.360 his evidence during this cross examination that basically a factory 0:09:24.400 --> 0:09:27.679 reset removes all of the details except perhaps maybe some 0:09:27.720 --> 0:09:31.000 security details, maybe some sort of serial numbers, and it's 0:09:31.080 --> 0:09:34.920 largely unable to be recovered, and that when there was 0:09:35.200 --> 0:09:37.760 this evidence being shown to the jury that all of 0:09:37.760 --> 0:09:40.520 these resets, according to the data, were in twenty twenty three, 0:09:40.679 --> 0:09:43.439 one sort of in February of twenty twenty three one, 0:09:44.120 --> 0:09:47.760 early August, sort of a few days prior to the 0:09:47.800 --> 0:09:51.600 next two factory resets, and that then the two factory 0:09:51.600 --> 0:09:54.320 resets that followed on the fifth and the sixth of August. 0:09:54.800 --> 0:09:56.800 It was sort of being asked by Colin Mandy, well, 0:09:56.840 --> 0:09:59.680 if there was a factory reset, especially not very long ago, 0:10:00.200 --> 0:10:03.200 how would that affect the data for the next lots 0:10:03.240 --> 0:10:05.679 of factory resets. So there was lots of questions about this, 0:10:06.160 --> 0:10:10.640 and the witness basically said, well, yes, there's no way 0:10:10.880 --> 0:10:13.600 that you can fully know exactly if that time is 0:10:13.679 --> 0:10:17.360 in or out. If it's been slightly altered, then potentially 0:10:17.360 --> 0:10:19.719 that could mean that the data you're getting could be 0:10:19.760 --> 0:10:22.120 slightly off. It's sort of hard to say when there 0:10:22.120 --> 0:10:24.360 has been that many factory resets on the phone. 0:10:24.440 --> 0:10:26.760 But when he was referring to the photographs on the 0:10:26.760 --> 0:10:28.960 tablet for example, and that time and date was also 0:10:29.040 --> 0:10:32.720 brought up again, the witness maintained that Windows ten that 0:10:32.880 --> 0:10:36.280 was being used at the time on the PC saves 0:10:36.320 --> 0:10:38.320 its own time. It's got like its own server or 0:10:38.400 --> 0:10:41.960 database that the time is linked in with. It's not 0:10:42.080 --> 0:10:44.520 up to the user, for example, or some other means 0:10:44.520 --> 0:10:47.240 to change the time so there was lots of questions 0:10:47.240 --> 0:10:50.200 in the evidence today for this particular witness about the 0:10:50.240 --> 0:10:52.880 times and dates and how we ensure things are what 0:10:52.920 --> 0:10:53.760 they say that they are. 0:10:53.960 --> 0:10:56.800 And he also mentioned as part of his evidence that 0:10:57.240 --> 0:11:00.240 when they're making these copies, there's a copy of the 0:11:00.320 --> 0:11:04.200 data that's made that it's essentially unwritable, it's uneditable, so 0:11:04.360 --> 0:11:07.520 that whoever's coming in and examining that can't go adding 0:11:07.640 --> 0:11:10.840 or changing things. It exists as it was taken off 0:11:10.880 --> 0:11:11.480 that device. 0:11:11.679 --> 0:11:12.440 That's right now. 0:11:12.480 --> 0:11:15.240 Moving on to the next witness that the jury has 0:11:15.360 --> 0:11:20.160 heard from now, this was a forensic pathologist, doctor Brian Bier, 0:11:20.280 --> 0:11:24.520 and he gave evidence about the autopsies that were conducted 0:11:24.679 --> 0:11:28.080 on the three lunch guests who passed away. And the 0:11:28.120 --> 0:11:31.800 first autopsy that he was talking about was Heather Wilkinson. 0:11:31.840 --> 0:11:34.560 And it wasn't actually himself who conducted that autopsy. It 0:11:34.600 --> 0:11:36.840 was a colleague, he said, but that he has a 0:11:36.840 --> 0:11:40.000 more senior role and he was overseeing that particular procedure. 0:11:40.559 --> 0:11:43.640 Yeah, that's right, doctor Brian Bier. He's worked at the 0:11:43.679 --> 0:11:46.480 Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine for a number of years now, 0:11:46.520 --> 0:11:49.960 but even longer as a forensic pathologist. Then his evidence 0:11:50.040 --> 0:11:53.080 really got underway. We know he either conducted or was 0:11:53.120 --> 0:11:57.640 overseeing the autopsies of the three lunch guests who passed away, 0:11:58.080 --> 0:12:00.320 and he was explaining the dates and time that they 0:12:00.480 --> 0:12:04.120 arrived and then the process to really have a look 0:12:04.160 --> 0:12:06.880 at not only what was going on in their body 0:12:06.920 --> 0:12:08.800 at the time of death, but whether or not they 0:12:08.840 --> 0:12:12.360 had any pre existing health conditions that could have impacted 0:12:12.360 --> 0:12:13.679 the medical treatment that occurred. 0:12:13.840 --> 0:12:16.200 He concluded essentially for all of them that there was 0:12:16.240 --> 0:12:20.640 this extensive neurosis of the liver which was very consistent 0:12:20.720 --> 0:12:24.400 with amanita poisoning or toxic mushroom poisoning. Now, there's been 0:12:24.720 --> 0:12:27.800 different parts of evidence given by different witnesses at medical 0:12:27.880 --> 0:12:31.800 levels about making these diagnoses, but it was in the 0:12:31.840 --> 0:12:34.360 bodies of the two female lunch guests. There wasn't any 0:12:34.400 --> 0:12:37.160 of this particular toxin that was able to be found 0:12:37.200 --> 0:12:39.760 from a death cat mushroom, but there was some of 0:12:39.800 --> 0:12:42.600 that toxin found in the results from Donald Patterson. 0:12:42.679 --> 0:12:45.199 Yeah, the way he explained it, Penny was he told 0:12:45.240 --> 0:12:48.000 the jury that all three had acute liver failure and 0:12:48.080 --> 0:12:51.040 multiple organ failure that was consistent with someone who had 0:12:51.080 --> 0:12:55.200 eaten deathcat mushrooms and while Donald patterson he remains were 0:12:55.240 --> 0:12:58.400 the only ones that tested positive to Amanita toxin or 0:12:58.440 --> 0:13:01.800 death cat mushroom poisoning. Both sisters, he said, had organ 0:13:01.880 --> 0:13:05.400 damage that were really consistent with the same It was 0:13:05.440 --> 0:13:08.080 a urine test that had been taken from Don Patterson 0:13:08.120 --> 0:13:11.280 while he was still in hospital that was tested and 0:13:11.320 --> 0:13:16.160 that's where the positive result came for deathcat mushrooms. The 0:13:16.200 --> 0:13:21.520 pathologist explained that when all three arrived at his facility, 0:13:22.160 --> 0:13:25.560 police had asked for immediate autopsies to be conducted on 0:13:25.600 --> 0:13:28.040 the bodies, and he was told that it was believed 0:13:28.040 --> 0:13:30.480 that all three had eaten deathcat mushrooms as well. 0:13:30.760 --> 0:13:33.559 And there was one part of his evidence that he 0:13:34.000 --> 0:13:37.200 answered a few more questions on regarding Gail Patterson and 0:13:37.280 --> 0:13:40.680 any pre existing conditions. He spoke as well about Don 0:13:40.720 --> 0:13:43.440 Patterson's heart and that it was a little more enlarged 0:13:43.440 --> 0:13:46.160 and heavier than you would expect of someone sort of 0:13:46.160 --> 0:13:48.400 for his description at that time, and maybe that he 0:13:48.440 --> 0:13:51.199 did have a sort of a high blood pressure of 0:13:51.280 --> 0:13:53.800 hypertension at the time. But he noted in his evidence, well, 0:13:53.880 --> 0:13:55.720 there's probably a lot of people even in this room 0:13:55.800 --> 0:13:59.160 who were living with that condition and that he did 0:13:59.160 --> 0:14:01.760 believe that there was definitely this amanita poisoning as well. 0:14:01.800 --> 0:14:05.120 But he also noted with all of these particular autopsies, 0:14:05.160 --> 0:14:07.200 they also looked at all of the medical history that 0:14:07.200 --> 0:14:09.600 had come from all of the different hospitals, yes, local 0:14:09.600 --> 0:14:13.240 hospitals standing on the Austin and various other notes too. 0:14:13.240 --> 0:14:15.760 But he spoke a bit more about what he found 0:14:15.760 --> 0:14:17.680 around Gail Patterson and her health. 0:14:18.240 --> 0:14:20.920 Yeah, so the first autopsy that was taken place was 0:14:20.960 --> 0:14:23.360 on Heather Wilkinson. She was sixty six at the time 0:14:23.400 --> 0:14:26.080 and she died on the fourth of August twenty twenty three, 0:14:26.200 --> 0:14:28.560 and he said he was unable to find any existing 0:14:28.840 --> 0:14:31.440 medical conditions, but noted that she did appear to have 0:14:31.440 --> 0:14:34.840 been a fairly healthy lady at the time. She said there, 0:14:35.080 --> 0:14:37.320 he said that there was a very extensive necrosis of 0:14:37.320 --> 0:14:40.280 the liver in her case, and of all of her 0:14:40.320 --> 0:14:43.680 liver cells had died. And in addition to that, he 0:14:43.720 --> 0:14:46.040 said the small and large bow, well the lining of 0:14:46.080 --> 0:14:49.480 it was also necrotics. So his explanation was quote that 0:14:49.520 --> 0:14:54.560 the cells were dead. Beier said that Wilkinson's sister, Gail Patterson, 0:14:54.600 --> 0:14:57.200 who was seventy at the time also died from acute 0:14:57.200 --> 0:15:00.920 liver failure and multiple organ failure. Was the second autopsy 0:15:00.920 --> 0:15:03.480 that was conducted, and then the third autopsy, he said, 0:15:03.520 --> 0:15:06.320 was conducted on Don Patterson, who was seventy at the time, 0:15:06.440 --> 0:15:07.840 three days after his death. 0:15:08.200 --> 0:15:10.560 Let's hear a little bit more about what doctor Brian 0:15:10.640 --> 0:15:13.080 Beier said in his evidence. It's not their real voices. 0:15:13.600 --> 0:15:17.360 Did Gail Patterson suffer from any serious pre existing health 0:15:17.400 --> 0:15:20.600 conditions that you have been able to gather from reading 0:15:20.640 --> 0:15:24.440 her medical records and performing the autopsy on her body. 0:15:24.720 --> 0:15:27.880 I'll just qualify by saying there was no serious issues 0:15:28.000 --> 0:15:31.480 just prior to her death. Having said that, in twenty twenty, 0:15:31.600 --> 0:15:35.240 she had an episode of Herpes simplex type one encephalitis, 0:15:35.600 --> 0:15:39.359 which she presented with basically changes of fever and headaches 0:15:39.720 --> 0:15:44.119 in essence, just issues with understanding and expressing herself understanding 0:15:44.160 --> 0:15:48.640 other people anyway. That was from all accounts, diagnosed fairly quickly. 0:15:49.040 --> 0:15:52.840 She had a CSF sample taken and that confirmed that 0:15:52.880 --> 0:15:55.960 this was due to the Herpes simplex type one, and 0:15:56.080 --> 0:16:00.800 also a subsequent CT and MRI scans showed changes which 0:16:00.840 --> 0:16:04.640 were very consistent with that as well. She was given 0:16:04.640 --> 0:16:07.920 antibiotic creme and appears to have recovered quite well from that. 0:16:08.320 --> 0:16:11.960 I think early in January of twenty twenty one. There's possibility, 0:16:12.160 --> 0:16:15.680 some question that there could be a reoccurrence, but I 0:16:15.760 --> 0:16:18.840 think that was not confirmed. And my understanding from reading 0:16:18.880 --> 0:16:21.880 the notes that she made quite a good recovery with 0:16:21.960 --> 0:16:25.480 just some slight issues, particularly with her ability to express 0:16:25.520 --> 0:16:27.240 and understand various things. 0:16:27.760 --> 0:16:30.920 Did that in any way contribute to her death. 0:16:31.560 --> 0:16:31.680 No. 0:16:32.280 --> 0:16:35.680 At this point, Penny Aaron Patterson could be seen crying 0:16:35.800 --> 0:16:37.560 in the dock. There was tears in her eyes and 0:16:37.600 --> 0:16:40.280 she was looking up at times as be confirmed his 0:16:40.360 --> 0:16:41.440 autopsy results. 0:16:41.560 --> 0:16:44.760 Yeah, and this was sort of a part of the 0:16:44.800 --> 0:16:47.600 evidence that the jury has already heard in this fifth 0:16:47.640 --> 0:16:49.800 week of the trial, but there was quite a bit 0:16:49.840 --> 0:16:53.320 more evidence to come from another witness. They've been told 0:16:53.320 --> 0:16:56.440 that that is a Department of Health official, Sally Anne Atkinson, 0:16:56.480 --> 0:16:58.920 will come back after this with some of her evidence 0:16:59.200 --> 0:17:01.760 and what she could recall to the jury and told 0:17:01.760 --> 0:17:06.280 them was her memory of her communications with Aaron Patterson. Now, 0:17:06.320 --> 0:17:09.320 Sally Anne Atkinson told the jury that she was in 0:17:09.359 --> 0:17:13.159 a senior public health sort of official role within Victoria's 0:17:13.240 --> 0:17:17.040 Department of Health. At the time that the fatal lunch 0:17:17.080 --> 0:17:20.080 took place back at the end of July twenty twenty three, 0:17:20.080 --> 0:17:23.720 and subsequently she was involved over the following days and 0:17:23.800 --> 0:17:28.600 weeks in regards to particularly trying to find the source 0:17:28.800 --> 0:17:31.000 of what had made these people so unwell. 0:17:31.440 --> 0:17:33.520 Yeah, she explained to the jury that she was working 0:17:33.560 --> 0:17:36.680 as part of this gashtro illness related team, and it's 0:17:36.720 --> 0:17:41.160 a team which oversaw illnesses such as typhoid and salmonella 0:17:41.400 --> 0:17:43.879 and these types of things. And she said that's when 0:17:43.880 --> 0:17:47.480 she received a notification about a potential outbreak of death 0:17:47.520 --> 0:17:51.120 cap mushroom poisoning. It was an alert from a doctor, 0:17:51.359 --> 0:17:54.399 she explained to doctor Connor. It was about two thirty 0:17:54.440 --> 0:17:57.640 three pm on the thirty first of July twenty twenty three. 0:17:58.040 --> 0:18:00.440 She said the doctor believed that there'd been an outbreak, 0:18:00.440 --> 0:18:03.480 which is what she classified as anything involving more than 0:18:03.520 --> 0:18:06.359 two people that may have occurred at a family luncheon. 0:18:06.560 --> 0:18:08.399 Yeah. So, she said, the way that she initially got 0:18:08.480 --> 0:18:12.000 this information was there's sort of a number that people 0:18:12.040 --> 0:18:14.399 can call, and she said through her evidence that they 0:18:14.440 --> 0:18:16.880 would be notified the team that she worked in by 0:18:17.000 --> 0:18:21.080 either council workers perhaps members of the public, doctors, other 0:18:21.119 --> 0:18:25.359 medical staff about any kind of food or gastro intestinal 0:18:25.600 --> 0:18:28.680 related outbreak and that you know that could include then 0:18:28.840 --> 0:18:32.080 trying to stop a product of self that had someone 0:18:32.080 --> 0:18:34.199 ella in it getting out and trying to sort of 0:18:34.640 --> 0:18:37.120 really get on top of any outbreaks in the community, 0:18:37.119 --> 0:18:39.439 and that an outbreak. As you said, anything over two people, 0:18:39.480 --> 0:18:41.840 they considered that an outbreak. But she said that this 0:18:41.920 --> 0:18:44.680 message came from doctor Connor McDermott, a doctor at the 0:18:44.720 --> 0:18:47.200 Austin Hospital, and that it had come initially as sort 0:18:47.240 --> 0:18:49.760 of a phone message, a voicemail, and it was very 0:18:49.800 --> 0:18:50.640 therefore short and. 0:18:50.600 --> 0:18:52.639 Brief, but it adverted to an email, yeah, and it. 0:18:52.600 --> 0:18:54.760 Had come through this email system and into her inbox, 0:18:54.800 --> 0:18:56.560 and that she had that little bit of information. She 0:18:56.680 --> 0:18:59.280 thought that they were family members and that there might 0:18:59.280 --> 0:19:01.760 have been some sort of luncheon. But from there she 0:19:02.040 --> 0:19:05.440 spoke about the different communications she had with Aaron Patterson 0:19:05.480 --> 0:19:08.400 and Jane Warren from the prosecution was taking her through 0:19:08.440 --> 0:19:10.560 all of these different points, and we'll take you through 0:19:10.600 --> 0:19:14.320 the same way. The jury heard this chronological sequence of 0:19:14.359 --> 0:19:18.000 evidence that Sally Ann Atkinson was giving in relation to 0:19:18.480 --> 0:19:21.639 all of the phone conversations. Text conversations that she was 0:19:21.680 --> 0:19:24.200 having at the time as she was sort of being 0:19:24.240 --> 0:19:26.160 prompted and questioned by Jane Warren. 0:19:26.359 --> 0:19:29.560 Initially, she said she reached out to Simon Patterson and 0:19:29.600 --> 0:19:32.280 the next of kin for those that were in hospital, 0:19:32.320 --> 0:19:35.080 and initially she said, Simon didn't really want to speak 0:19:35.119 --> 0:19:38.639 to her, which wasn't an uncommon thing, so instead that 0:19:38.680 --> 0:19:40.960 she sent him an email with like an official letterhead 0:19:40.960 --> 0:19:42.880 that said that she was from the Department of Health, 0:19:42.920 --> 0:19:45.399 and she said at this time he was then happy 0:19:45.440 --> 0:19:47.960 to speak and she asked him whether or not Aaron 0:19:48.000 --> 0:19:52.680 Patterson was known to forage mushrooms, and Simon Patterson's response 0:19:53.320 --> 0:19:55.280 to her memory was, it wasn't something. 0:19:54.960 --> 0:19:57.000 That I ever really knowed her to do. 0:19:57.080 --> 0:19:59.879 And when I asked if the lunch guests were was 0:20:00.040 --> 0:20:03.199 commonplace for them to eat together, he said, no, it 0:20:03.240 --> 0:20:05.000 would have been years ago, if at all. 0:20:05.240 --> 0:20:07.280 Yeah, and that that was probably some sort of family 0:20:07.359 --> 0:20:10.040 meal if they had eaten together at all. But as 0:20:10.080 --> 0:20:14.200