MUSHROOM killer Erin Patterson’s lawyers have revealed a “catastrophic” blunder from her trial in a last-ditch bid to quash her life sentence.
The triple murderer was jailed for life with a non-parole period of 33 years for serving her in-laws poisoned beef Wellingtons laced with death cap mushrooms.
Her mum-in-law Gail Patterson, dad-in-law Donald Patterson and Gail’s sister Heather Wilkinson died in hospital within six days of the fatal lunch in July 2023.
Patterson, 51, was also convicted for the attempted murder of Heather’s husband, Ian Wilkinson, a small-town local pastor who miraculously survived the poisoning.
Her legal team have now begun their appeal to quash her convictions and order a retrial, with Patterson appearing at court via video link from behind bars.
Barrister Richard Edney slammed the “catastrophic” decision to place members of the jury in the same hotel as a police witness, journalists and members of the prosecution.
Edney argued that the move “fatally undermined the integrity of the verdicts” and means the verdicts should be quashed and a retrial should take place “so that justice can be done”.
The court heard that, despite Edney’s complaints, there was no evidence that the jury came into contact with anyone at trial.
Edney said: “This was a hotel with windows, with common areas and the reasonable possibility cannot be excluded that the jurors sighted the informant or sighted solicitors from the Office of Public Prosecutions.”
Justice Peter Kidd instantly challenged the submission, saying: “If they did view or see the practitioners, so what?”
While the defence acknowledged that there was no evidence that the jury spoke with the witness or prosecution, they highlighted that the crossover occurred during jury deliberation week.
Another contentious point concerned the prosecution’s use of evidence about Patterson’s activity on the foraging website iNaturalist and mobile phone tower data.
At the trial, the prosecution argued that Patterson found two sightings of death cap mushrooms reported online near her home.
The court heard how her phone connected to cell towers in both areas, with the prosecution indicating she’d visited both spots.
Hours after visiting one of the locations, Patterson bought a food dehydrator to prepare the mushrooms for the fateful beef Wellingtons.
CCTV captured Patterson travelling to a local dump and disposing of the dehydrator, which was later found to have traces of the deadly mushrooms.
When sentencing Patterson, the judge said that it didn’t necessarily matter where she sourced the mushrooms from as it was abundantly clear that she had.
Patterson has maintained she unknowingly used foraged death cap mushrooms in the meal.
However, Ian Wilkinson, the sole survivor of the lunch, told the trial that Patterson served guests individual portions, separate from her own.
Toxicologists confirmed all four guests displayed symptoms consistent with death cap mushroom poisoning, a highly lethal species found in the local area.
Symptoms can begin within hours of ingestion and include severe vomiting, diarrhoea and abdominal pain.
In the most serious cases, they can temporarily subside before returning days later, often leading to liver and kidney failure and death.
Police have also alleged Patterson may have attempted to poison her ex-husband, Simon Patterson, on three separate occasions between 2021 and 2022.
Simon previously wrote about a near-fatal illness that left him in a coma for 16 days, during which doctors advised his family to prepare for the worst.
