Speaker 1: Already and this this is the Daily Off. This is
Speaker 1: the Daily ohs oh, now it makes sense. Good morning,
Speaker 1: and welcome to the Daily OS. It's Wednesday, the seventh
Speaker 1: of May. I'm Billy FitzSimons.
Speaker 2: I'm Zara Seidler.
Speaker 1: We are taking a break from our election coverage today
Speaker 1: to update you on another event that you've probably been
Speaker 1: hearing a lot about in the headlines, the mushroom trial.
Speaker 1: In case you missed it, the murder trial of a
Speaker 1: woman accused of killing three people by serving them poisonous
Speaker 1: mushrooms is underway in Victoria's Supreme Court. Aaron Pattison was
Speaker 1: charged with murder after three people died following a meal
Speaker 1: at her home in July twenty twenty three. She pleaded
Speaker 1: not guilty, and so now we are in the middle
Speaker 1: of a six week trial. On today's podcast, we're getting
Speaker 1: you up to speed with the details of the case.
Speaker 3: Billy, I remember when this story first broke a couple
Speaker 3: of years ago, it was absolutely everywhere. I think it
Speaker 3: was just such a unique story and there were so
Speaker 3: many elements that just defied logic really that it was
Speaker 3: all anyone was talking about. But as you said, it
Speaker 3: has been two years since the incident took place. So
Speaker 3: can you just give everyone a really quick recap of
Speaker 3: what happened.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Before I tell you what happened, I'm going to
Speaker 1: take you through kind of who the main characters are
Speaker 1: because there are so many different details in twists and turns,
Speaker 1: so I'll just give you a very brief overview. So,
Speaker 1: the first person, who I think is probably the most
Speaker 1: important person you need to know about to understand this
Speaker 1: is Aaron Pattison. She is fifty, she is a mum
Speaker 1: of two, and she's the person who is accused of
Speaker 1: these murders and who is currently standing trial now. She
Speaker 1: was married to a man named Simon Patterson, and he's
Speaker 1: the father of their two children. They married in two
Speaker 1: thousand and seven split in twenty fifteen, but they never divorced.
Speaker 1: They were just estranged, and they by all accounts, had
Speaker 1: a relatively good relationship. It kind of went downhill in
Speaker 1: late twenty twenty two, which we will talk about, but yeah,
Speaker 1: they pretty much had a quite good relationship. And Simon
Speaker 1: didn't attend the lunch, which is kind of at the
Speaker 1: center of all of these allegations, but it was his
Speaker 1: relatives who did attend the lunch, and three of them
Speaker 1: died and one fell critically ill. He was invited to
Speaker 1: the lunch, but he didn't attend. He actually pulled out
Speaker 1: the night before the lunch because he said that he
Speaker 1: felt uncomfortable attending. Now to speak about the lunch that
Speaker 1: I've referenced many times, so this is where the alleged
Speaker 1: poisoning took place, and it all happened in July twenty
Speaker 1: twenty three. Now Erin invited her estranged husband's parents, so
Speaker 1: her ex in laws. Their names are Don and Gale Patterson,
Speaker 1: and she also invited her ex husband's auntie and uncle,
Speaker 1: whose names are Heather and Ian Wilkinson. Now at this lunch,
Speaker 1: she served them a beef Wellington. Now, following this meal,
Speaker 1: all four guests became critically ill, and Don, Gale and
Speaker 1: Heather died. So those are the two parents of Simon.
Speaker 2: So her ex in laws, her ex in laws.
Speaker 1: They both died, and then the ex husband's auntie also died.
Speaker 1: The uncle was very ill. He spent many weeks in hospital.
Speaker 2: That's Ian, right, that's it.
Speaker 1: He survived, and so he was the sole survivor of
Speaker 1: this lunch. Erin, who was eating at the lunch. She
Speaker 1: did not fall critically ill. I don't think that she
Speaker 1: was sick at all. Now, following their deaths, Erin was
Speaker 1: charged with three counts of murder and one count of
Speaker 1: attempted murder.
Speaker 2: Just quickly before we get into the trial.
Speaker 3: I've read a lot of headlines about this, and one
Speaker 3: of the ones that I haven't really understood is about
Speaker 3: one of the murder charges against Aaron being dropped. Can
Speaker 3: you just talk me through that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So that did happen, but it was actually in
Speaker 1: relation to something separate. So Aarin was also charged with
Speaker 1: attempted murder of her ex husband, who I've been speaking about, Simon,
Speaker 1: but that was not in relation to this lunch.
Speaker 3: So there was a separate murder charge, not in relation
Speaker 3: to this lunch that police had previously brought against Aaron Patterson,
Speaker 3: but that has been dropped.
Speaker 1: Now that has been dropped. It was dropped at the
Speaker 1: start of the trial. We didn't really find out too
Speaker 1: many details.
Speaker 2: About I always thought it was about the lunch.
Speaker 1: No, okay, Yeah, we didn't really find out too many
Speaker 1: details about why it was dropped. We just know that
Speaker 1: it was dropped. And so now this entire trial just
Speaker 1: centers around this lunch and the alleged murders and attempted
Speaker 1: murder of the four guests.
Speaker 3: Okay, so this trial is focusing on a lunch where
Speaker 3: three people who became critically ill and died and another
Speaker 3: was very unwell but managed to survive. So what have
Speaker 3: we learned during the course of this trial, because it's
Speaker 3: now been a week or so, what have we learned
Speaker 3: so far?
Speaker 1: So mostly what we have learned so far is from
Speaker 1: Erin's estranged husband, Simon. He was the first witness called
Speaker 1: and he told the court that his relationship with Erin
Speaker 1: was amicable following their split in twenty fifteen, but that,
Speaker 1: like I said before, it started to go downhill in
Speaker 1: late twenty twenty two, and that was allegedly over child support. Okay,
Speaker 1: just quickly to recap. Simon was invited to the lunch
Speaker 1: in July twenty twenty three, but he canceled the night
Speaker 1: before via text, and we have seen those text messages
Speaker 1: come out during this trial, and so in the text
Speaker 1: messages shown to the court, Aeron told Simon that she
Speaker 1: wanted to have an important conversation with him and his
Speaker 1: relatives about her health at this lunch. And so she
Speaker 1: said that his cancelation was quote really disappointing, and she
Speaker 1: noted that she had spent many hours and a small
Speaker 1: fortune preparing a special meal.
Speaker 3: So a special meal being a direct quote from what
Speaker 3: she said to Simon in those texts.
Speaker 2: It's so fascinating.
Speaker 3: You mentioned there that she said or it's alleged that
Speaker 3: she said she wanted to talk about her health.
Speaker 2: What was that about? Do we have any more understanding
Speaker 2: about what the health issues were?
Speaker 1: Yeah, so Erin did tell her lunch guests that she
Speaker 1: had been diagnosed with ovarian cancer. That wasn't true, though
Speaker 1: we have since learned and both sides, so defense and
Speaker 1: prosecution agree that she was not diagnosed with that disease.
Speaker 1: So that's not in contention.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: We also know that in March she did do a
Speaker 1: cervical cancer test, but that returned negative.
Speaker 3: Okay, So we underst and that she wanted to talk
Speaker 3: to her ex's family about a health update, and that
Speaker 3: that health update turned out not necessarily to be true.
Speaker 2: What else have we learned from Simon's testimony?
Speaker 1: So we also learned that Simon told the court he
Speaker 1: visited both couples the following morning. He said both were
Speaker 1: not feeling well at all.
Speaker 3: I thought that they had died fairly quickly after and
Speaker 3: that's not what happens.
Speaker 2: There was time between.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And one thing that he mentioned is that his aunt, Heather,
Speaker 1: commented on the plates that Aaron used.
Speaker 2: And a lot of headlines about these plates.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so Heather told Simon that Aaron served herself on
Speaker 1: an orange plate but served her guests their meals on
Speaker 1: these gray plates. Now, when he was cross examined by
Speaker 1: the defense, Simon said that it was fair to assume
Speaker 1: the mismatch could have been due to the fact that Aaron,
Speaker 1: quote had a bunch of ceramic plates that weren't all
Speaker 1: the same. But like you said, the plates have emerged
Speaker 1: as kind of a key piece of evidence that is
Speaker 1: being scrutinized.
Speaker 3: We're going to be back with the rest of today's
Speaker 3: deep Dive after a quick message from our sponsor. Simon
Speaker 3: wasn't at the lunch, so his testimony he's reflecting on
Speaker 3: the conversations he had after the lunch. But you said
Speaker 3: that there was a soul survivor, so there was someone
Speaker 3: at that lunch who can testify. What have we heard
Speaker 3: from Ian?
Speaker 1: Yes, so he only entered the witness box yesterday and
Speaker 1: he started off by kind of describing his relationship with Erin.
Speaker 1: He said that they had a fairly amicable relationship and
Speaker 1: that they were very happy to accept the invitation to
Speaker 1: go to lunch. One thing he mentioned is that Heather,
Speaker 1: his wife, wanted to look at the pantry in Aaron's kitchen.
Speaker 1: He said that she had a particular interest because they
Speaker 1: had just built one in their own home. But he
Speaker 1: said that Erin was really reluctant about this visit to
Speaker 1: the pantry and that she kind of followed Heather In.
Speaker 1: I will just point out these all allegations, so these
Speaker 1: haven't been put to Erin, but this is his recounting
Speaker 1: of what happened.
Speaker 2: Because Aaron hasn't testified yet. No, okay understood.
Speaker 1: He also confirmed what we were talking about before about
Speaker 1: these different plates, so he again said that the four
Speaker 1: guests ate on one style of plate and Erin ate
Speaker 1: on another. He also confirmed that after the lunch, Aaron
Speaker 1: told the guests that she had a life threatening cancer
Speaker 1: and that she was particularly anxious about telling their kids
Speaker 1: about it. He said that then when they left, it
Speaker 1: wasn't until that night at about eleven PM when Heather
Speaker 1: first started to feel sick, and then he soon after
Speaker 1: that also started to feel quite ill, and then the
Speaker 1: next day all four guests went to hospital where they
Speaker 1: were treated for suspected mushroom poisoning.
Speaker 3: I just want to shift gears a bit because I've
Speaker 3: read about a Facebook group and I've seen quite a
Speaker 3: few headlines around that.
Speaker 2: What's that in relation to?
Speaker 1: Yeah, so this is also something that has come out
Speaker 1: that Aaron was allegedly part of a true crime Facebook
Speaker 1: group where she met some people on there and they
Speaker 1: created a private group chat, and she allegedly told those
Speaker 1: people about dehydrating mushrooms and a particular interest that she
Speaker 1: had in dehydrating mushrooms. In one message exchange shown to
Speaker 1: the court, Aaron had said, quote, I've been hiding powdered
Speaker 1: mushrooms in everything. So that has been another piece of
Speaker 1: evidence that has emerged in the trial so far. And
Speaker 1: some of the people that were in that true crime
Speaker 1: Facebook group have also been called as witnesses to this trial.
Speaker 3: Okay, so it's a six week trial. You said, we're
Speaker 3: about one and a half weeks into it. When are
Speaker 3: we expecting to hear from erin because obviously these are
Speaker 3: just allegations that she hasn't been able to defend yet
Speaker 3: because she hasn't been in the wind Sparks.
Speaker 2: When will we hear from her.
Speaker 1: I'm actually not sure when exactly we will hear from her,
Speaker 1: but I do know that we have heard from her
Speaker 1: once before, and that was in August twenty twenty three,
Speaker 1: so that was before she had actually been charged with
Speaker 1: the murders.
Speaker 2: Oh I remember this, yes, yeah.
Speaker 1: It went quite viral and it actually made global headlines
Speaker 1: when it happened, and she was very emotional at the time.
Speaker 1: So the media found her and they asked her questions
Speaker 1: and she was really emotional talking about she said, losing
Speaker 1: people that she loved, and she said she was devastated
Speaker 1: by it. I thought I'd play a little bit of
Speaker 1: that clip.
Speaker 4: I just can't fit them what has happened that Ian
Speaker 4: and Henna have lost her lives and Gaya has lost
Speaker 4: her life, and Donna's still in her foot and I pray,
Speaker 4: I pray that he pulls through.
Speaker 1: So that was almost two years ago. Now, like I said,
Speaker 1: we haven't yet heard from Erin herself, but I'm sure
Speaker 1: that will be a very big moment when we do
Speaker 1: hear from Erin in the witness box.
Speaker 3: Just quickly before we end, is this trial being decided
Speaker 3: by a judge or a jury? Because I'm always curious
Speaker 3: in cases like this where there's so much media attention,
Speaker 3: like everyone around the country was talking about this story NonStop.
Speaker 2: Is it a judge or a jury.
Speaker 1: It's a jury. It's a jury of fifteen. Read what
Speaker 1: you're saying about it being a high profile case. I
Speaker 1: have seen the judge ask the jurors many times not
Speaker 1: to read any social media commentary about this case so
Speaker 1: that their opinions aren't influenced by others.
Speaker 3: Yeah, really really interesting and certainly a story that has
Speaker 3: gripped the country, and so we'll be sure to bring
Speaker 3: you updates, certainly as Aaron herself begins to testify and
Speaker 3: defend these murder charges and later once that jury, as
Speaker 3: you said.
Speaker 2: Hands down their decisions. So thank you for explaining that.
Speaker 3: Billy, thank you, and thank you for joining us for
Speaker 3: another episode of The Daily Os. The best way that
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Speaker 3: like what we're doing. We'll be back later today with
Speaker 3: the headlines but until then, have a great Wednesday.
Speaker 1: My name is Lily Maddon and I'm a proud Arunda
Speaker 1: Bunjelung Kalkadin woman from Gadighl country. The Daily oz acknowledges
Speaker 1: that this podcast is recorded on the lands of the
Speaker 1: Gadighl people and pays respect to all Aboriginal and Torres
Speaker 1: s right island and nations. We pay our respects to
Speaker 1: the first peoples of these countries, both past and present.