Hidden True Crime - Death Cap Mushroom Triple Murders: Mysterious Poisoning or Mass Murder?

Episode Date: August 20, 2024

Erin Patterson, an Australian woman, has pleaded not guilty to charges of murdering three members of her ex-husband's family and five charges of attempted murder. Our Sponsors:* Check out Acorns: https://acorns.com/HIDDENTRUECRIME* Check out Acorns: https://acorns.com/HIDDENTRUECRIME* Check out Armoire and use my code HIDDENTRUECRIME for a great deal: https://www.armoire.style* Check out Effecty and use my code HIDDENTRUECRIME for a great deal: https://www.effecty.com* Check out Happy Mammoth and use my code HIDDENTRUECRIME for a great deal: https://happymammoth.comSupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/hidden-a-true-crime-podcast1836/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Lately, I've been trying to be more intentional about what I wear, intentional about everything, just choosing pieces that feel effortless, still put together, timeless, but also not overthinking it every morning. It's why I keep going back to quince. Their pieces just make getting dressed easier and I feel so classy. I feel elevated. The fits are flattering. The fabric is really high quality. Everything is wearable day to day. I actually got this really, really, beautiful yellow V-neck midi dress from them, and I paired it with some Italian leather sandals. It's one of those outfits that just works. It feels polished but still comfortable. It's exactly what I've been looking for. What surprises me, though, is the quality for the price. Quince uses

premium materials like European linen, organic cotton, but they cut out the middleman. So everything is priced way lower than you'd expect. Refresh. your every day with luxury you can actually use. Head to quince.com slash hidden true crime for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. That's quince, quince, q-u-in-c-com slash hidden true crime for free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.com slash hidden true crime. Hello, jens. It is time for another live hidden hour with Dr. John Matthias, forensic psychologist, who all also happens to be my husband and yours truly. We are glad to be back here and very glad to be doing a case that is outside of the Western United States.

To introduce those of you to this case, it is a fascinating case, and we're going to share with you why we think this is such an important case out of Australia. We are going to start by introducing you to Aaron Patterson. She is the person that is charged with the alleged crime. Did she or did she not? Purposely poison, the beef Wellington that guests ate at her lunch, causing three deaths, almost four deaths. There are four victims, three deaths. There are her former in-laws. She was married, recent former in-laws, two years to their son.

And their names are Dawn and Gail. and then her ex-husband's aunt and uncle are there, Ian and Heather. Ian is the sole survivor. He was hospitalized for so long. He's now been released. So this isn't a, I think that's another part of this puzzle, and we'll talk later about that, that the victims, four of them, they're not her ex-husband.

They are four innocent people, which makes the motive, It makes another unusual thing with this case. Right. So Simon Patterson is her ex-husband. Gail and Don Patterson are Simon's parents. Heather Wilkinson is Simon's aunt. Heather is also Gail's sister. If we look at the family dynamic,

Ian Wilkinson is Heather's husband. Ian also was a pastor in Coromura, which was close to Leon Geyon, which is where the house, Aaron's home. That's where her home was located. Aaron Patterson's home in Victoria, in Victoria, Australia. Yes, her ex-husband is Simon. So he's also speaking out, but he was not at the lunch. He had canceled before. He declined. He was going to come and then declined. So what else do we need to share about this case before why it's important? Yeah, let me just run through quickly. So let me, let's just create a little bit of a

timeline and explain what happened. So July 29th, 2023, Aaron Patterson hosts a lunch for Gail and Don Patterson, Heather Wilkinson, and her husband, Ian Wilkinson, the pastor, Anne Simon. And the goal, I'm going to read what a friend said about this. So let's talk about why this lunch was being held and why Aaron was hosting it. That, by the way, is going to be, I'm sure law enforcement is going to be really interested in that question. What was the purpose of the lunch?

Right. In other words, because that'll get to motive. Why did she host this lunch? Well, this is what a friend said who seems to have some information about why this lunch was held. Quote, this wasn't just a lunch. It was an intervention with the pastor as a mediator, unquote. The family was worried about Aaron's, quote, mental state and attended the, the lunch to make sure she was in the right mental health to resume her relationship with Simon.

So in other words, the purpose of the lunch, based on information we've heard, the purpose of this lunch was to affect a reconciliation between Aaron and Simon, apparently, and Aaron wanted his parents and family members present to help mediate the discussion or the reconciliation. but the family may have been somewhat hesitant to attend but decided to attend because they were concerned about Aaron's quote mental state. The friend later called it mental health. Either way, it seems like the family,

even if there wasn't a reconciliation with Simon, it seems like the family may have been concerned about Aaron's mental health issues solely, even if Simon wasn't in the picture, her mental health issues with potentially as a parent with the children. So the lunch was, the purpose was a reconciliation, but it was also to kind of assess Aaron's mental state and mental health

and to see whether not only a reconciliation was appropriate based upon her mental health, but whether any type of relationship with Simon and the kids seemed like a realistic possibility. So that was the purpose. So the lunch is held. Beef Wellington is the dish that is served to all the people present. Initially, Aaron says that the children, the two children were present. The two children, there's two children. We don't know their names.

They're ages 12 and 14. They're minors, so their names have been withheld from public. And Aaron later changes that story and says the children were at a movie during the lunch. So initially she said they were present and they ate. She later said they were at a movie and they ate leftovers after the lunch. Approximately, it's hard to know the exact. timeline here, but after this lunch on the 29th, later that evening within, let's say, two to eight hours, the people that ate the meal started becoming ill. And they started going

to the hospital because their sicknesses were becoming increasingly worse. They were escalating. So to the point where they couldn't function at all on their own and they needed medical intervention. So they went to the hospital and they were all hospitalized. Obviously, we know the outcome now that Gail and Don Patterson passed away, as did Heather Wilkinson. Ian has survived. He was released on September 23rd. Fortunately, he made it. And another part of the story is that on July 31st, two days later, Aaron Patterson was admitted to the hospital with Stombeckle. stomach pains, apparently from similar complications that the other people experienced from eating that lunch.

Aaron obviously survived it. We don't have access to the hospital records or medical records to know how severe her illness was, but clearly she survived. Those are the events that transpired until recently she wasn't arrested or charged. So on November 3rd, she finally is arrested. there were, have there been a couple of searches of her home? There was one conducted on the morning of her arrest. They were looking for thumb drives and electronic devices.

They were looking apparently for specific information related to the lunch, I would assume. They decided to arrest her and they charged her with three counts of murder and five counts of attempted murder. Yeah, that's the interesting part because of some past, because of some past what they believe now. was an attempt or multiple attempts on her ex-husband. There were three previous incidents involving Simon that may have involved poisoning. We don't, the public doesn't know anything. Nothing has been released about those incidents with the exception of Simon's description of one of those incidents in May of 2022, where he was hospitalized for 16 days.

and he required three emergency operations on a small intestine. He was in an induced coma for a big portion of that time. He says on his Facebook post from the May incident, May of 2022, he says, quote, my family was asked to come and say goodbye to me twice as I was not expected to live. So clearly, at least the May incident was severe. And Simon, as he states on his Facebook post,

he believed that he was very lucky to still be alive. So three of the attempted murder charges are from past incidents. Two of them are related to the lunch. One of those would be Ian who survived, obviously. So it was an attempted murder. And Simon, who did not attend. She was also charged with attempted murder of Simon, who bailed out at the last minute.

Take a listen to Aaron now. It's a tragedy what happened? Can you tell us about the meal that you pulled? I'm so. Don is still in hospital. The loss of Ian and Heather. And Gail, there were some of the best people that I've ever met. Gail is like,

Gail was the mum that I didn't have because my mum passed away four years ago. And Gail's never been anything but good and kind to me. And Ian and Heather were some of the best people I've ever met. They never did anything wrong to me. so devastated about what happened. Can you tell us to be... And the loss to the community and to the families

and to my own children have lost their grandmother. Can you tell us a bit more about the lunch? What I can tell you is that I just can't fathom what has happened. I just can't fathom what has happened that Ian and Heather have lost their lives and Gail has lost her life and Dawn is still in hospital and I pray

I pray that he pulls through because my children love him and you must be pretty shaking out with this as well I'm devastated I love them and I can't believe that this has happened and I'm so sorry that they have lost their lives

I just can't believe it just can't believe it can you tell us where the mushrooms came from were they ticked in the property area I just, I just, leave me alone, please. Police say you're a suspect. Do you have anything to say about that? Yes, I say, I didn't do anything.

I love them. And I'm devastated. They're gone. And I hope every five of my being, that's on full street. That's what I have to say. All right. This case out of Australia,

Leongata. John, why don't you share a little bit about this case, a background? on this case. We've both been studying it, but John, of course, doesn't take his assessments lightly and for days has been studying this case. Well, let's talk about the video first, I think. So, body language analysis is very popular these days. And I have to say that her body language is a little confusing to me. She doesn't appear to be crying in the sense that these are dry tears.

But, you know, I should mention that that isn't necessarily indicative of someone who's being dishonest. That people have different ways of expressing emotion. And some people cry, dry tears, and some don't. And, you know, my point is that I think in the end, in our field, in forensic psychology, it's really, really difficult to tell whether someone is lying. And I think body language alone typically won't get you there. because people experience grief and stress in very different ways, and they cry in very different ways. And I think there's so many factors that would influence this type of reaction,

that it's hard to say, well, these are dry tears. She's lying. Maybe she is. Maybe she isn't. I mean, putting aside the fact that our field really struggles to determine whether someone's lying, and that's why, by the way, lie detectors are not admissible in court, that's why body language experts don't testify in court. because it's not, it's in exact, it's not a precise science.

And my reaction to this, at least to the body language, is that it's confusing to me. I get kind of mixed messages here. It does appear to me that there's some real grief. But on the other hand, I don't know. You know, somebody that's capable of poisoning multiple people or allegedly poisoning multiple people, if that's what she did, could probably present a pretty compelling facade. and can probably express emotions in a way that would be somewhat deceptive. So it's not clear cut from the video.

And I think, and people mention that. You know, there's some people who said that they believe it was an accident and some people didn't. And I think the video only kind of confuses that. It's not clear cut at all. I will say this, that putting aside the body language from her video and listening carefully to what she says, which people know I typically do. So I don't put as much stock in body language, but I do put a lot of stuff.

talking language and what people say and what that means. And if you listen carefully, there's a moment, there's one sentence in there that I think is particularly interesting. She says about midway through, or maybe a little more than midway through, she says, quote, I'm so sorry that they have lost their lives. And that, you know, the reason I thought that was really significant is because when she said, when she started that phrase, when I first heard this. and she said, I'm so sorry.

I thought she was heading into some type of apology. I thought that there was a moment there where we're going to get an admission. Interesting. So she starts with first person. So notice that she starts with first person and she's the agent. She's taken responsibility. She says, I'm so sorry that. And then she goes into they have lost their lives.

So she switches from first person to third person. And she switches the attribution from herself to them. I think in a way she's shifting blame. What I was expecting was something like, I'm so sorry that I served a meal that led to their illnesses or something like that. Right. Because she's acknowledged that she served the meal with the mushrooms, but she goes to, I'm so sorry that they have lost their lives.

So I think that's from a psychological standpoint. And I think that's really interesting because she's not taking responsibility. And she's shifting blame to the victims. And somehow, and almost in a peculiar way, she's blaming the victims for their demise, that they have lost their lives. They didn't just lose their lives. They lost their lives because she served a meal to them. And even if that meal was an accident, she's still not taking responsibility.

And she's shifting blame. and she's changing the attribution from herself to them. That's a really good point. There's two scenarios here, but both of them took place at her house. The question is accident or purposeful, but either way, she is responsible. Right.

There's no way around that. Right. So if you really pay attention to that, to her statement, the body language is less important than that particular sentence. because I think that particular sentence really says so much about this situation that, again, when I heard her say, I'm so sorry, I thought, oh, here we go. She's going to apologize.

And I didn't expect her to say, I'm so sorry that I murdered them, although you could draw that inference. I expected her to say, I'm so sorry that I served a meal that led to their illnesses, right? And that way, she's taking responsibility. she's offering a bit of an apology. It's more realistic. It's more culpable. But what you get is, I'm so sorry.

I think, honestly, I think she wanted to say, I'm so sorry. I think if there were no charges that were coming or if she could just walk away, I feel like she wanted to say, I'm so sorry that I murdered them. Or maybe not something so strong,

but I'm so sorry that I harmed them. How about that? So I thought that line was particularly revealing. I think that there's some guilt, that beneath that line, beneath that sentence. And so that... And that she's distancing herself. Another point people made is that she actually said that Ian had died,

but it was Don that died. Apparently, I don't know, again, I don't know how severely, but Aaron was sick and went to the hospital afterwards as well. She went later. Yes. That, by the way, is one of the fascinating elements of this case, which is that most poisoners are astute in, to prey on their victims one at a time.

And so what's one of the fascinating elements of this case to me is that you have a simultaneous poisoning. So you have multiple people that are poisoned at the same time. Multiple people go to the hospital at the same time. How could someone who wants to poison, which tends to be a fairly clandestine type activity, how could someone who wants to get away with poisoning not believe or know that they're going to draw a tremendous amount of attention in themselves

if they poison a group of people at the same time. So in a peculiar way, although I don't think there's a lot of parallels between Aaron's psychological profile and that of a mass murderer, in some ways this is a bit of, it looks like a mass murder. Right. You have multiple fatalities, three. you know, Ian was extremely lucky to walk away alive. Everybody that I've seen talk about death cap mushrooms, which appear to be the cause of the poisoning or the cause of the fatalities,

everyone who talks about death cap mushroom says that they're extremely fatal. They're extremely lethal. And so Ian was very lucky. The odds were extremely high that you would have been looking at five fatalities. Fortunately, that didn't happen. But that would be the equivalent of a mass murder. So you have We tend to think of mass murders occurring with guns and other, you know, means of other weapons. But in this case, you know, the Death Cap Rushrooms act as a weapon. So it looks like a mass murder. And anybody, I'm sure anybody who falls to crime knows that mass murders garner attention.

Yes, they do. Yes, they do. If you're looking to- Moscow, Moscow, Idaho is a mass. Yes. Well, in any school shooting is a mass murder. If you're looking to stay off of the radar of law enforcement, this is not the type of crime you want to commit. No.

This issue of simultaneous poisoning is actually an argument for potentially why this may have been an accident. Because most poison, Erin, one thing about Aaron Patterson is she has very high intelligence. According to people that have worked with her and known her, they all say one thing typically. and that is that she's extremely intelligent. So given her level of intelligence, given her capacity to plan, given her ability to look at details and to plan out details in this particular crime,

you'd think that she would think about the consequences of potentially murdering multiple people at the same lunch and that she might be aware of the attention that that would draw to herself. So that's peculiar. And I think, by the way, that is that would get us to this question of why has this particular crime

been so popular and why has it gathered so much attention in the media and in Australia this is apparently this has received a massive amount of attention Yeah there's been numerous press conferences from police asking people to stop speculating On that issue by the way

Let's just say that you know as we saw from the initial comments some people think it was an accident, some don't. Let's say that these crimes are alleged at this point, that this is speculation, that we do these for educational purposes and to create some dialogue around forensic psychological issues and mental health issues. And so I'm sure there's going to be times tonight when I will act as if she might be guilty, but let me preface with the fact that I don't know for sure.

And none of us know for sure. and we don't know all the evidence that AFP, Australian federal police and Australian law enforcement have. They've been very tight-lipped about a lot of the evidence. So in that sense, we're putting together an analysis here

that's fairly limited, but I think we have enough to draw some useful inferences and to have an interesting discussion. I think some other elements of this crime that are particularly interesting are that Aaron, Aaron Patterson herself,

is, to quote one of her friends, she's eccentric, One of her friends referred to her as an eccentric genius, that she's a bit odd, right? And so that's of interest, that the family went over to the lunch concerned about mental health issues. There's still a mystery here in terms of, was this an accident? Was it not an accident? Was it premeditated murder? What was this?

There's a lot of clues where you can make an argument either way. So I think you have kind of that Sherlock Holmes component, which draws people in. And we all want to participate in that mystery and try to figure out that mystery. So I think that's another important component. And then I mentioned earlier, kind of the simultaneous poisoning component also makes this case stand out in the sense that most poisonings are individual. And they involve harming people typically one at a time. You don't poison people in groups, otherwise you draw too much attention to it. And so here you have a poisoning in a group.

And then the final element, I think, it has to do with the community. This occurs in a couple of small communities, Leon Gatha, Coromberra, which is where Gail, Don, Heather, and Ian all lived. And the detective inspector, Dean Thomas said, he said, basically, let's not forget the three people have lost their lives. And he said, the consequences of this crime will, quote, reverberate for years to come. And some of that, I think, has to do with the fact that in smaller communities and small really tight-knit communities, you just don't expect this type of incident to occur.

And so I think the one question that this also raises is, how does a community cope with the presence of such malice? That communities like this aren't used to seeing these types of behaviors and they're not used to seeing, I use the term malice. Some other people might use the term evil. But what happens when malice or evil or this type of situation kind of enters these communities that might be a little sheltered and have never seen anything like this? So I think that's a part of this narrative. Most people don't realize how much their personal information is being bought and sold every day. Data brokers are making billions, pulling details about you from public records and the internet, and then packaging and selling it, usually without your consent.

That's how your information lands in the hands of scammers, spammers, even stalkers. It's why you get endless robocalls and why ads seem to follow you everywhere. That's where ORA comes in. ORA actively removes your data from broker's sites and keeps it off. They also instantly alert you if your information shows up in a breach or on the dark web. But ORA goes beyond data protection. With one app, you get a VPN, antivirus, password manager, spam call protection, dark web monitoring, and even up to $5 million in identity theft insurance, all backed by 24-7 U.S.-based fraud support.

Other companies might sell just credit monitoring, or just a VPN. ORA gives you all of it, together, at the same price competitors charge for just one service. Start your free trial today atora.com slash remove. Protect yourself now atora.com slash remove. What's one financial lesson you learned the hard way? I'll go first. It's not too late to start saving. Today's episode is sponsored by Acorns.

Acorns is a financial wellness app that makes it easy to start saving and investing for your future. You don't need to be an expert. Acorns will recommend a diversified portfolio that matches you and your money goals. You don't need to be rich. Acorns lets you get started with your future. the spare money you have right now. And one of the best things about acorns is they allow you to see projected growth on their website.

Simply go online, type in how much money you'd put in and see the potential future balance of your account. Sign up now and join the over 13 million all-time customers who've already saved and invested over $22 billion with acorns. Head to acorns.com slash hidden true crime or download the acorns app to get started. Paid non-client endorsement. Compensation provides incentive to positively promote acorns. T-A-Rons, Tier 1 compensation provided.

Investing involves risk, Acorns Advisors, LLC, and SEC-registered Investment Advisor. A few important disclosures at acorns.com slash hidden true crime. Hormonal changes are so hard to see the least. Hot flashes, anyone else. Add in the thousands of hormone disruptors that are in our environment, and it is even worse. From our water, food, the air we breathe, and the clothes we wear, they are everywhere. But the good news is that when hormone harmony enters the picture, it can help

reduce hormonal symptoms in women of all ages. Hormone Harmony is a supplement that contains science-backed herbal extracts called adaptogens. The best thing about adaptogens, they help the body adapt to any stressors like chaotic hormonal changes that happen naturally throughout a woman's life. Hormone Harmony is actually part of my personal 2024 playbook. Hormone harmony makes no compromises when it comes to quality and it shows. For a limited time, you can get 15% off your entire first order at Happy Mammany.

com. That's happy H-A-P-P-Y-M-A-M-M-O-T-H.com. Just use the code hidden true crime at checkout. That's code hidden true crime. Use that with happy mammoth.com for 15% off today. I think you have so many elements here that really come together that are of interest to people. And some of those elements occur at a very deep level. There's a lot of questions here. And it really touches on a lot of really fundamental questions about community and human evolution and fears of food, right? And so, so anyway, so I think that's why, that's why it's received unprecedented attention in Australia. Also going to prove that Australia is a wonderful, wonderful country. In fact, I, I live there for a semester during school and I've always wanted

to move back there. But everything deadly is really in Australia. I swear, when it comes to snakes and spiders and mushrooms. Right. But I, I love down under. I love it. There's a lot of things in Australia that can kill you, not least of which apparently now, we can add death cap mushrooms to that list. Just you guys know, we are just getting started. We are going to discuss the multiple facets. We're going to get into the motive tonight.

Well, you asked a question at the end about, was this an accident or not? And so we don't, of course, have all the information to make a complete determination of that, that I think we can begin thinking about it. So let's start getting into that question a little more. And I also want to talk about Aaron's background a little bit, how people perceive her, and we'll talk a little bit about the psychological profile poisoning. But let's start with, I think a big question law enforcement is going to want to know here

is where do the mushrooms come from? That's obviously a critical question because determining that will have a huge impact upon this question of whether this was an accident or not. So what we know at this point is that Aaron Patterson released a written statement to police. She's been questioned by police also a few times now. But on August 11th, she had an attorney where she wrote a statement. She sent it to law enforcement. Some of the local news channels in Australia received that statement.

And one of the things Aaron said, she purchased a mixture of button mushrooms at a major supermarket chain. This is in the statement. So she purchased a mixture of button mushrooms that is major. supermarket chain, and she purchased dried mushrooms in an Asian grocery store in Melbourne, although she was unable to identify the specific shop where she bought the dried mushrooms from the Asian grocery store. I would have thought her story would be I was foraging mushrooms, right? And I picked the wrong one. But this is her story, and she's sticking to it. Well, I think she's committed to it because she put it in a statement. But obviously, the story

poses some problems because, well, number one, there have been no other fatiguan. There have been no other fatalities related to death cap mushrooms from any packets of mushrooms sold from any Asian grocery stores in Melbourne. So in other words, that you would expect this grocery store, this Asian grocery store to have multiple packets of mushrooms that she seemed to imply were laced with death cap mushrooms. So first of all, she says that she purchased button mushrooms. You can rule out button mushrooms, I guess, immediately as a cause of death because button mushrooms are harmless. unless there's some presumption that the button mushrooms were also laced with death cap mushrooms. But the major supermarket chain that she says she purchased the button mushrooms from,

law enforcement apparently has already checked with them. And they had no access to or they have not received any death cap mushrooms whatsoever. So let's rule that out. So it would have to be, by her statement, the mushrooms that were the dried mushrooms from the Asian grocery store. So, of course, it's a little suspicious that she can't identify what store, you know, the specific store where she purchased these mushrooms. That's kind of a red flag, kind of a big red flag. Yeah, a little bit of a red flag. So she's keeping that vague.

And my guess is, of course, that law enforcement is going to really press around that issue. And they're going to force her to kind of name that store so they can go in and investigate further. Otherwise, it's just, it's so vague that, you know, it's a store that exists in her imagination, apparently. But let's assume that she did purchase these dried mushrooms from the Asian grocery store. You have to assume that these wouldn't be the only mushrooms at that store that would have been laced with death cap mushrooms. So you have this evidence that, as far as we know, the months that have passed since this lunch, there have been no other fatalities related to any death cap mushrooms from an Asian grocery store in Melbourne. So that's a problem for Aaron Patterson, obviously. The next question,

I think the next important question has to do with the dehydrator. And I think the dehydrator is going to be a central part of this case because it's contradictory statements about it that apparently in an earlier disclosure to law enforcement, Aaron Patterson said she had a dehydrator, but she had placed it in the dump, which is also called the tip in Australia, that she threw it in the tip months before the lunch. in her statement to police on August 11th, however, she said that she disposed of the dehydrator and the tip the day after the lunch.

Or several days after the lunch, apparently when she was in the hospital, Simon had sent something to the effect to Aaron in the hospital. Simon had said, talking about the dehydrator, he had said, is that what you used to poison them? Right. And according to Aaron, she became spooked by that question, and she thought that people would point the finger at her and accuse her a murder. And that's why she then disposed of the dehydrator at the dump.

Of course, the question is, if she was using dried mushrooms from the Asian grocery store that were laced with death cap mushrooms, why would she even need to have a dehydrator? Right, exactly. That's number one. Number two, why the contradiction? I mean, she's saying that she became afraid.

I think police have recovered the dehydrator. The big question here is, does the dehydrator contain traces of the death cat mushrooms? That's going to be a critical issue. Because if it does, then it would suggest that Aaron, who had some history of foraging mushrooms, according to friends, a friend has said that Aaron had books on mushrooms and she knew lethal mushrooms from non-lethal mushrooms and that she had a history of foraging mushrooms. If the dehydrator has any of these toxic substances from the death cat mushrooms, then obviously that really throws her entire explanation into question.

Right. So her whole story about the Asian grocery store now becomes a complete deception. And I want to point out with the Dehydrator too. You know, again, sort of how we said either way she's responsible. This is either an accident or a purposeful, a murder. If this was a deeded accident, you know, you'd think that she'd be like, oh, my gosh, I cooked him with this dehydrator. Here you go.

check this out, do what you need to do. I know that if something like this happened at my home, I would be so forthcoming. Find out what happened. Here you go. Here's this. It's always going to be super suss to throw something away because all of a sudden you're afraid.

Right, exactly. But it also contradicts her story about the Asian grocery store and the dry, she didn't need a dehydrate her to dry mushrooms that were already dried. Right. She needed to make him extra crisp for some reason. I don't think that's a thing in Beef Wellington, but let's say, you know what I mean? Even then. She wanted to double dehydrate them then or something, or I don't know.

And yeah, you bring up a good point, which is that let's call them innocent people, that most people that are innocent of committing crimes, they tell a coherent and cohesive story that doesn't change. They know that story is true. They're not afraid of telling that story. they tell it up front. And so in this particular case, I think, as I told you earlier today, it seems to me like her best explanation could have been something like, I was out foraging for mushrooms.

I picked these mushrooms that I didn't realize were death cap mushrooms. I made a mistake. I dehydrated them. I thought they would work with the meal. I put them in the meal by accident, not knowing what they were, right? Something like that. Right. And I'm sure, by the way, law enforcement is going to have way more than we're aware of.

we're just kind of scratching the surface here. Again, this is speculation. But I think these are some critical issues and contradictory issues and issues that really question whether this is an accident. And even if she tells that story later, I was foraging, didn't know these were deadly. I used them in the meal. As you point out, that means she's still responsible, but it would suggest that she might qualify for a charge that's much lesser like manslaughter as opposed to murder one. So they have her with murder one. right now if this truly was an accident. So I don't know.

Let's talk about that. And let's talk about that. You know, your hypothesis for either an accident. I mean, that's what we're talking about right now, but accident versus purpose. What do you think? I want to know. I do want to share this. And some people might parent shame me right now, but that's okay.

I might deserve it. I deserve that sometimes. But our little boy was watching it because he'd heard about this case. And so I was like, I don't know. do you think? You know, it just happened and he's watching. He's told us today. He said he thinks that she was faking it, that it was, according to our little guy, she was not truly crying. So we'll see how he is. You know, I think in many cases, there's always a piece or a couple pieces of evidence that are really difficult to explain a way. Yes. So in the Murdoch case, you have

the dogs in the kennel and you have Paul's cell phone, the defense can't get around that information. You know, I think in here with the dehydrator, let's see if there's any traces of death cap mushrooms in the dehydrator. I think that's a really critical issue. But why would she lie about throwing it out? What was she using it for? Again, if she's buying these dried mushrooms from the Asian grocery store, she doesn't need a dehydrator. And so I think the dehydrator becomes a real problem for her in terms of trying to explain this. She clearly thought so too, which is why she dropped it off at the tip. You know, another obvious problem for her is why didn't she become as ill as the other people,

as the other people attending the lunch? So that's going to be hard to explain away as well. We've heard from a good source that Ian apparently was not really, how could I put this, that he didn't enjoy the meal so he didn't eat as much. as the other people. He wasn't as impressed with the salmon moose as the beef on Wellington. The beef on Wellington was not to his liking. Right. So he wasn't a fan of Beef Wellington. He didn't eat that much. So it's not hard to imagine that Aaron understand she's got a problem here if she serves a meal to everyone and she doesn't eat it. And that if everyone becomes sick and dies

and she doesn't, she knows that's a problem. My guess is that she may, have had a very small amount, knowing that she would get just sick enough to make it look like a good alibi or explanation. But I don't know. I mean, again, we don't know did the toxicology report on her stomach pains come back, you know, that she had, were the toxins in her body related to death cap mushrooms? I'm not sure. And can they measure the amounts? Right. Right? Because, I mean, to me, it seems reasonable, assuming that the hospital admission is accurate for Aaron, that she may have tasted a little bit of the meal or just enough to know that she wouldn't die from it,

but she could be admitted to the hospital and she was willing to take that risk to normalize the event. Right. That she got sick. The other problem she has is you have a surviving victim. Nobody knows what Ian has to say, but having a surviving victim is certainly not going to help her case. I think she, if she did murder these people, I think she fully intended for none of them to survive.

Well, that's a question. And that's actually a major question that I've been talking about with my Australian friends, our hidden gems. I think that's the ultimate question right there is, okay, so she did this on purpose? Did she intend to murder them or did she want to make them un-Wallington to do the luncheows and thing? Where, but I mean it where,

you know, she could get some attention for taking care of them in the hospital or feeling bad. but you're saying that if this is on purpose and this is truly her charges are correct for murder, that she wanted them all to die. She wanted all of them. So there's three options here, I think. One is that her intention was to, like factitious disorder, her intention here was to induce some type of illness in the victims where she could swoop in and go to the hospital and help them and, you know, be perceived.

as the rescuer. So, yeah, like factitious disorder, you know, perhaps or factitious disorder imposed upon another, which is Moonschausen's by proxy, that she as the sort of the conductor of this lunch or symphony, that she's in control of making them sick. And then she gets what we call secondary gain from that illness in the sense that she gets attention. She gets to help them. She gets to perceive as sort of the good guy that saves the day. The other option is that it was fully an accident that she didn't know what death cat mushrooms were. She served them without understanding the risks.

Everybody got sick or died without her knowledge of what was occurring. That's the accident argument. And then the final argument is that this is premeditated murder. She planned it. She knew exactly what she was doing. One argument for that, by the way, is so according to, to some experts, you need roughly, in a meal like this, you would need at least 10 full death cap mushroom.

So a death cap mushroom, by the way, all the toxins are in the cap. That's why it's called a death cap mushroom. So you'd have to have at least 10, probably more, 10 to 20 of these caps in the meal. And that, by the way, would also be a strong, to create the impact she created, you'd need that many. That would be a strong argument against this Asian. grocery store purchase because there's almost no way. It's almost inconceivable that an Asian grocery store would have

death cap mushrooms laced with other mushrooms in such a quantity of, let's say, 10 to 20 of these caps that you could harm or kill this number of people at a luncheon. That's the argument for premeditation here is that she knows what these mushrooms are. She knows what they do. I think she thinks that she can lace. So my understanding of Beef Wellington is that you create a paste. So she later says that the children ate the beef Wellington, but she scraped the mushrooms off. But my understanding is that that wouldn't be the case, that if there are mushrooms, they're in a paste,

and typically they're ground into the paste. So you don't scrape mushrooms off. You'd have to scrape the paste off. But I don't think you could do that without harming the kids. But the argument for premeditation is that if she knows that she knows that she's using death meth cap mushrooms, she's not trying to get, she's not trying to make people ill. She's not trying, her goal here doesn't seem to be to create illness or sickness in the victims. Death cap mushrooms are extraordinary lethal, extraordinarily lethal.

Her goal has to be death. I would think. if she knows, if she's out foraging these types of mushrooms, everybody that talks about these types of mushrooms agrees that it doesn't take a lot to get people sick and to kill them and that people have survived them and been extraordinarily lucky. In many cases, they've had to have liver transplants because death cap mushrooms attack the liver in a very, very serious manner.

So if she's out foraging for mushrooms and she knows what these are, I don't think she's trying to get people sick. I don't think this is a version of factitious disorder. I think her goal has to be death or some lethal outcome. Okay, so we get rid of factitious disorder or Munchausen as some people know it. Right. So that's off the table. So we've eliminated that.

This was. I think so. That's assuming unless you argue the best argument I think she has and she's already lost this, she's already, unless she goes back and changes her story. But the best argument I think she had was that I wanted to include some mushrooms in this dish. I picked these mushrooms that were all close to home. I didn't know they were death-capped mushrooms. I mistook them for some other type of mushroom.

They look really appetizing. They look delicious. I brought them home. I dehydrated them. I put them in the meal. I was shocked when people got sick because I didn't know what these were. Something like that. That would be the accident argument.

But she's not saying that. that. She's saying she bought them in an Asian grocery store, which apparently was laced with these death cap mushrooms, or that's what she's implying. And even though the quantity of mushrooms in that bag would not be nearly sufficient, I don't think, to kill this many people. Right. And there'd be, again, there'd be no need for a food dehydrator. Yeah. It seems to me that if you're going to use step cap mushrooms, the intended outcome has to be a lethal outcome. The big question we haven't addressed is motive, right? I think that's what we need to discuss too. Yeah. So in terms of, was this an accident or not, you know, do I know for sure? You know, I mean, we don't know all the

evidence. Again, these are still alleged crimes. We don't know exactly what law enforcement knows, of course, it seems like based on what we do know, it seems as if you'd have to go in the direction of premeditated murder, but, you know, that the accident argument, just based on what she said publicly and based on information we do know, it seems like a bit of a stretch. But that's not to say that, you know, maybe there is an Asian grocery store that mistakenly sold a bag of death cat mushrooms, and she didn't know that. And I don't know. I mean, it's not entirely implausible that it could have been an accident. Yeah. I want to bring up one other thing too because we're talking accident purpose and then we'll get into moda but i think

this plays a part too cass says she had plenty of practice with them on her husband's previous attempt to murder him she actually nursed him back to health in one occasion that that brings up an interesting thing i think one reason that people have wondered about munchausen or factitious disorder or the idea that she was wanting to make them sick was she you know what the question of she's also charged with attempted murder of her husband and i think the question is well did she just want to nurse him back to health and to feel good, you know. So again, but I also want to point out that Kaz is saying, look, she's had practice. And wouldn't you agree, John, and maybe we need to get into this later, but someone that's

doing something like this is probably isn't her first rodeo, right? Like, if this is on purpose and her charges are accurate and this is murder of the first degree, this is likely not her first poisoning, correct? So she said practice. She's had, she's had experience. Right. Well, her husband, apparently, I only know one of those incidents, but in May, as I said, like it was roughly May 25th to 27th of 2022. Simon was hospitalized for a very, very serious illness that seemed to be related to, according to a close friend of Simon's to a, quote, ingested toxin. What the medical records say, we don't know for sure. But it certainly seems consistent with poisoning.

But yeah, I mean, it seems like she has some history of poisoning her ex-husband, Simon. Yeah, yeah, his social media posts are heartbreaking to read. He talks about how he almost lost his life and that he was in the hospital for weeks and that his digestion is never the same, but they'll never find out what exactly went wrong. And now we have Aaron Patterson, his ex-wife, charged in his attempted murder. Right. So the rough dates. So Simon Patterson, her ex-husband, was hospitalized in November of 2021 for symptoms similar to poisoning. As I mentioned just previously in May of 2022 for poison-like symptoms. And then September 9th of 2022. So only a few months later for similar symptoms for poison-like symptoms. So it does appear that. And that, and I, Obviously, that's another part of this story, that if she has this history of multiple poisoning intertoms on Simon, then obviously, when you have this latest dinner on July 29th of 2023, it just, it appears to be a continuation of that pattern, obviously. But you'd have to prove, you'd have to prove that, I don't know what law enforcement has or what medical records they have, but you'd have to prove that you'd have to prove that those.

previous attempts were, and they seem to believe it because they're, they're charging her for those previous attempts, but you'd have to show that those illnesses were a consequence of poisoning, and you'd have to be able to tie her into those poisoning attempts, which again, we don't, we don't know if that, you know, we, we, we just know the charges. We don't know for sure how law enforcement is going to accomplish that goal. Yes. So, to motive, to motive. A lot of speculation about motive. And let's start there because there are so many thoughts about motive. You know, in fact, I mean, here's a question.

Okay. Do you think she wanted to be the only parent, grandparent, in the family? Why kill her husband's whole side? But the question here is why kill her husband or ex-husband's whole side? What is the motive here? Yeah. So let's back up a little bit.

Well, there's a couple things to understand here. One is to maybe get a little bit of understanding of who Aaron Patterson is we don't know a lot about her past. We don't know a lot about our history. So that's going to be a little difficult. We can get a little bit of a glimpse into who she is. But I think it's also important to understand some of the research on poisoners. And if we can understand more generally the motives that people who poison other people exhibit, then I think we can start maybe unraveling this case a little better.

So let me start with there's a couple, you know, there's not a huge amount of research on people who poison other people. So let's say that. There's really no such thing as a really accurate, valid psychological profile of a poisoner simply because there's just not enough data. There's not enough information to really develop that type of profile. However, there is some research that has looked at enough cases. to develop some hypotheses. And I'm going to go with those. And specifically, there's a book by Michael

Farrell, 2017, called The Criminology of Homicidal Poisoning. It's a very interesting and useful book. It's fairly recent. Chapter 7 has a chapter called Poisoners in their characteristics. There's another source. It's John Trestrail. He wrote a book called Criminal Poisoning. there's a second edition in 2007. Those are going to be my main sources for developing some of these ideas. But Trustell says that poisoners have, there's two types of victims that they seek out. Specific victims who are known to them or random victims. So if you think about this particular case, for example, obviously Aaron knows everybody at that lunch.

So the victims would be specific because she knows them. Some of the statistics on poisoning, by the way, show that 90% of poisoners know their victims. So most poisons occur with people that are known to the poisoner. An example of a random victim would be for those who remember the Tylenol scare from 1982 where bottles of Tylenol were laced with, I'm trying to remember cyanide, I believe. Was it cyanide?

Yeah, this is an interesting case. because it was purchased at a grocery store. It goes along with the narrative that Aaron's laying out. Except in the Tylenol poisoning case, there was never anyone that was actually charged with those murders. There were, I believe there were seven fatalities, seven or nine. I'm not completely, it's been a while since I've looked at the Tylenol poisoning's, but I believe there were seven fatalities.

So that would be an example of random victims. The poisoner in that particular case was not targeting someone he knew. He was targeting a broad group of people that anybody who bought Tylenol, that he happened to lace with cyanide. So it turns out that the motives for, according to Trustrial, the motives for poisoners are different, whether the victims are specific or random. Introducing Taco Bell's new jalapeno citrus salsa with bright citrus,

real red jalapinos, guahillo chilis. Usually, you add sauce to the food. food, but when the sauce is this good, the food is just there to get the sauce to your mouth. That rolled cassidia, not a rolled cassidia anymore. Now it's a sauce shovel. Taco Bell's jalapeno citrus salsa, get it with any item on the canteen of chicken menu while it's here. The participating U.S. Taco Bell locations for a limited time only, while supplies last, contact store for availability.

If for specific victims, the main motive is money, which is actually, I think that's a really interesting to contemplate in this particular case because Aaron Patterson came from in 2019, her mother passed away and she received her mother's estate. And her mother was quite wealthy. Her mother left her a million dollar plus property somewhere on the Australian coast. Okay. She also purchased other million dollar properties with that estate. So Aaron Patterson has an estate that's quite lucrative and it appears that she was reasonably successful prior to then, I think. So the main motive for victims that are specific is money.

And you wouldn't, so in this particular case, you might not think that initially I thought, well, you know, she inherited a lot of wealth. She's well off. She has millions of dollars in real estate holding. I don't know what our net worth is, but obviously it's in the millions. you know, typically you'll see poisoning occur to collect on some insurance policy. And in this particular case,

I don't think you see that. But however, when I stopped and thought about that for a minute, I thought, well, perhaps it's something a bit different. Maybe it's trying to avoid sharing her estate. Maybe it's trying to avoid, maybe they're in a, you know, I don't, I think there. Custody? Well, no.

that I think, I don't know. I'm just, I'm speculating here, but that if Aaron is the one with the wealth, perhaps her perception is that Simon wants a piece of that wealth. Yes. And maybe Simon was suing her for some of her estate. Maybe Simon was wanted to split some of her home. I don't know. I'm just saying that.

Right. If money's involved here, it's not about collecting insurance money. It's more about trying to avoid sharing or splitting her money. or giving her money away. It's more about wealth. Protecting her money. Protecting her money. It's about wealth preservation, right.

So, and again, so, and when victims are specific, the other motive that poisoners have is the removal of something that's blocking a desired goal. So that might be more related to custody. That if Aaron's goal is to have full custody of her kids and not share them with Simon or his family, then perhaps that might be a motive. Another motive is revenge. And so according to some sources, this turns out to be the most common motive, revenge.

I think to me that's the most interesting motive here. If you think about the fact that the purpose of this lunch was to affect a reconciliation between Simon and Aaron, and all of a sudden at the last minute, Simon bails out of the launch. Cancels. Cancels, right. He's thwarting her goal of reconciliation. In fact, it's not hard to imagine that when he cancels, she's enraged. However, the problem with that explanation is that it appears there was so

much planning involved in this particular possible crime or alleged crime that it's hard to imagine that she just acted at the last moment. It seems like she had been planning this for a while. And my guess is if it is revenge, there's some other motives there, which is one thing we know is that prior to this lunch, there may have been talk of reconciliation. And Simon didn't seem to be interested. So Simon was rebuffing any attempt at reconciliation. And that could have really angered her as well. Just as an aside that early on when they split, it was actually Aaron. who initiated the split with Simon.

And in fact, one of Aaron's friends said that Aaron was, quote, unhappy in the marriage and she often felt like a single parent because Simon was never around. So all of these could be elements here that if they're not divorced, the estate, Aaron's estate could be in play and money could be more of an issue. You know, Simon could be trying to get some of her state. I don't know. These are all questions that we,

don't have the answers to law enforcement and the people surrounding this case are pretty, you know, pretty tight lips. So, but just speculating on this revenge issue, it's the most common motive of people that poison aside for money. And I think potentially have a situation here where Aaron is aware or anticipating the fact that this lunch isn't going to go well. and I think she's probably, you know, she's probably heard that Simon doesn't want to reconcile, and so she's prepared with this meal to harm everyone if she doesn't get her way.

And so in that sense, I think revenge does seem like a really feasible motive here. And in fact, I could go further than that and say that I think Aaron envisioned this perfect life of being married to Simon, and the marriage didn't go as planned, And so there's probably some anger about that. This is not the life she envisioned.

This is not the marriage she envisioned that another element, a characteristic of poisoners is they tend to be very childlike and immature. And they often live, they kind of create these fantasy worlds. Again, without knowing that much about Aaron, it seems like that might be in play here, that she's kind of having this life that didn't pan out the way she wanted it to. And she's angry about it. And she wants this reconciliation to kind of bring them back into the fold and to kind of create this fantasy that the family's back together.

Everything's fine, that they're, you know, that they're happy again. But I think Simon is broadcasting or telling people before the lunch, that's not going to happen. So I think she's already sensing before this lunch that things are not going to go her way. She's already probably thinking about revenge or planning revenge. And then when Simon cancels at the last minute, it just probably puts her over the top. So in other words, it was a little impulsive, kind of, that maybe she was not necessarily planning to do this until the cancellation. And it threw her over the edge. Planned, but perhaps she changed her plans at the last minute, that when Simon cancels, maybe she decides to eliminate his family members,

where she may not have originally planned that, right? I don't know. It's not hard to envision a scenario where maybe she cooked two beef wellingtons. One had the poisonous mushrooms. Sure. One didn't. And she's waiting to see what happens. She's maybe thinking, I'll save the poison one for Simon later.

I won't give it to family, right? But when Simon cancels and her dreams of reconciliation are shattered, I think she was probably enraged. She might have been a little impulsive. Maybe she pulled out the Beef Wellington with the poison and decided just to take it out on everyone. And to make Simon pay, in other words, revenge against Simon. Right, absolutely. And to make Simon pay.

If Simon wasn't interested in her, then the family should pay the price, especially as parents. But it's not hard to imagine different scenario that she was prepared for different contingencies. But Simon pulling out at the last minute really put her over. the top and really created some problems. Yeah, just the fact that this is a planned meal for reconciliation. Yeah, that feels that feels right to me. That is, that is so interesting that that's where this, the motive behind this has really confused me.

It's really, there's a comment here that I want to talk about you. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That it must be an excruciating death. I want to talk about the cruelty behind it. Yeah, right. I mean, it's revenge is one thing against Simon,

but let's talk about just the. absolute cruelty, this death, as you explained it. People that have survived this talk about the pain and the agony and the hospitalization. So I talked about the motives when victims are specific or known. Let's talk about, so this is again getting back to Trestrell's work. When the victims are random or not known, the motives tend to be sadism, egotistical belief in one's mental superiority, a desire to tamper and boredom leading to the willingness to challenge law enforcement. But what you just brought up this issue of sadism is interesting. So another characteristic of poisoners is, like many people that commit any type of murder,

is that they lack empathy. And oftentimes they're kind of guided by their own self-interest. And there tends to be a bit of narcissism involved in a lot of, murderers in general. Psychopaths in particular and narcissists are known to lack empathy and to be obviously very egocentric. So I think that would apply also to poisoners to some degree. But what's interesting here about Aaron Patterson is I agree that this type of death must be excruciating and horrendous and very painful. But one of the things about death cap mushrooms is they don't kick in right away.

So a lot of poisoners will poison someone and then they'll watch the outcome of that action. Oh, geez. They'll watch their victims die and that's where the sadistic component comes in, that they'll actually relish that. But here, the victims would have left the lunch, and it would. would have been hours before they started showing symptoms and hours before they checked into the hospital. And so it's an interesting dynamic because it's conceivable that somebody like Aaron could have some empathy, but because she's putting these murders at a distance or she's choosing a form of death where she doesn't have to witness it or see it. She only hears about it,

that she doesn't have to experience their pain. No. So there is maybe a little bit of a statistic component to that for sure because she knows they're going through all this pain. But yet, like, if you go back to the video, the opening video that we played, you know, it's confusing in the sense that this does look like someone who might have some empathy. This does look like someone who, she says she's devastated, right? She says the right things that would suggest some empathy. And that's confusing. But I think you can explain it in terms of she's putting these deaths.

out of her home and she's put it in their distance so she doesn't have to really experience it firsthand. Right. She sends them on their way feeling fine, having no idea what's... Right, right. So she can assuage your conscience. She doesn't have to feel as much guilt as she might feel otherwise. Interesting. Right. And that's where this becomes really confusing. I wonder if somebody like Aaron Patterson could actually poison someone and watch them die in front of her. You know, I don't know. With her, again, there's a lot of gray area here. here. She does seem to have some empathy in that initial video. I don't think you can argue that if she's, if her dry tears or crocodile tears, if that's when you want to call them,

I don't think that totally negates a bit of her empathy. Yeah. We of course don't know about Simon's situation. She's been charged with attempted murder there, but she might have seen him suffer. He says in June 29th, 2022, I have it up. here now I've pulled it up. This is his social media post. Some of you will know that I've had some serious medical problems since late May. I collapsed at home and then I was in a induced coma for 16 days to which I had three emergency operations mainly on my small intestine plus an additional planned operation. My family were asked to come and say goodbye to me twice as I was not expected to live. I was in intensive care for 21 days after which I was in the general ward for a week and now I'm in a

rehab place since last Saturday. I'm pleased to see the medical work has seemed to have fixed the serious gut problems I had, and I've been feeling great for many days. I feel no pain, and it all seems to have no impact on my personality character or anything else much. I have a big scar on my tummy, which is healing itself slowly. I have ICU acquired weakness, which is a common condition of people who lie in intensive care for as long as I did. I can walk and do normal daily functions myself, however, my left shoulder in particular is very weak. I've been working hard. I've been working hard to build muscle strength and to get back to basketball, hopefully in 20, 23. I'm expected to make a full recovery, so I'm back the same capacity before I collapsed.

But I guess I want to read that right now because it doesn't sound like she has much empathy for Simon. I mean, she had to see some of that. We don't know how much she was present during that. No, we don't. We don't know if it's his house or their house. So there's a couple of thoughts here that, and I'm not saying that she, you know, and I'm not saying that she's this at all. I'm not saying that she's a psychopath or narcissistic. I'm not diagnosing

her. Yeah, you're not. A general comment about psychopaths that they're exceptionally good at faking empathy, at feigning empathy, at drawing people in with this fake false empathy. The pity play. Right. Of creating this perception that they care when it's all an act. They don't really care. And so you could have that And looking at that video and that's not sufficient to make this determination, I'd have to sit in front of her in a jail cell probably for hours to really get a sense of whether she's faking it or not. But I mean, it's not apparent from that initial video that she lacks any empathy at all. Right, but we don't know. We don't know what's going on. Let's talk about Aaron Patterson just a little bit.

Yeah, what do we know about her? Yeah. What do we know? What do we know? What do we know? What do we know? she has a sister. I don't know if it's an older, younger sister, but she has one sister. Her mother's deceased. Her mother taught literature. Her mother died in 2019. She taught literature at a university

level, specifically issues around children literature and fairy tales. And her mother was, I went back and read some of the mother's articles. Her mother is a very astute, intelligent person who is quite, you know, literate. And Aaron seems to take on a lot of those qualities from her mother. I mentioned that she has some wealth. Her mother and her family left her quite a bit of money. Most of it seems to have been put into real estate. But in 2001 and 2002, she worked for Air Services Australia, which is she was an air traffic controller working for the government. there was a colleague there who has commented. By the way, all of her friends have so far remained anonymous,

so they don't want to be identified. But the friend referred to as, quote, an eccentric genius. She said that Aaron was, quote, very bright. She was unkempt, but she was also very abrasive. That's interesting to me that even going back to 2001 and 2002, this is someone who that term abrasive really stands out. The friend tells the story. that when she, in the first month that she was working there for Air Services Australia,

this is a quote from the friend. Aaron, quote, yelled at the head of the air traffic control department for tripping on her headset cord. So in other words, her boss, turns out it was her boss. It was the head of the whole air traffic control division. I don't know which department, by the way, or which division. But the boss trips on her headset and Aaron basically yells at her and berates her. and berates her, and she's new to the job. So, you know, one of the things, one of the perceptions and research bears us out to some degree

is that poisoners tend to be passive aggressive. They tend to be more non-confrontational. But that does not seem to be the case at all with Aaron. So that's an interesting that she tends to be pretty direct and blunt and abrasive. Aaron was also a part of a true crime group. She seems to have had an interest in true crime. So, you know, I don't think she was listening to us, but who knows? She met some friends in her true crime group.

So this is one of the people she met in the true crime group, and she actually communicated with her. I don't remember if they met in person, but they became friends. They developed a friendship for the true crime group. This is what the friend said, quote, she's talking about Aaron here. You have to imagine the most extreme introvert that you have ever met. That is Aaron Patterson, reclusive, only online friends. friends, unquote. So think about it. You know, I saw these comments by her friends, extremely bright, abrasive, reclusive. I thought the first thing that came to mind when I heard all these

descriptions, I thought of Ted Kaczynski, who's the Unabomber, hold up in a cabin in Australia, I mean, I'm sorry, in Montana by himself. And again, I don't know what's accurate here. I don't know, but it's interesting to think that Aaron Patterson, who doesn't appear to be particularly non-confrontational, but apparently is, according to this friend, is very reclusive with no friends. She looks, you know, Ted Kaczynski was extraordinarily intelligent. Ted Kaczynski acted out of revenge. He had grievances against the government and technology and modernization. Ted Kaczynski was eccentric.

In thinking about that, I actually came across an article which talked about, the Tylenol poisonings. And this was a 1982 article in Time magazine called Portrait of a Poisoner. They consulted with a group of psychologists and psychiatrists. And they actually said that poisoners, based on their perceptions of having done some work with people that poison, that poisoners often look a lot like people like Ted Krasinski. So I thought that was interesting. The characteristics they identified of poisoners were.

that they tend to be loners who are isolated and unnoticed. They have low self-esteem and a sense of inadequacy. They're hypersensitive. They take offense at both real and imagined slights. They're very meticulous and well-organized. They tend to be odd and eccentric, and they're obsessed with grievances, particularly with a deep sense of being wronged.

This article from 1982 in Time Magazine talking about the profile of what they believed to be the Tylenol Poisoner, I thought that description potentially fit Aaron Patterson fairly well. And if you look at some of the comments by friends about her being extremely bright, abrasive, eccentric, a genius, a recluse, no friends, right? I think it's starting to kind of fill out a little bit of a picture of who she was. It's not hard to imagine Aaron Patterson as someone who has a deep sense of being wronged

because of the failure of her marriage, potentially maybe some custody issues that are in a play that we don't know about. Right. But as I dug a little deeper into this, I thought that was a really interesting parallel. And even to the point where in that Time magazine article, there's a psychologist in here from the University of California,

Chris Hatcher, he says, to think of the personality of an arsonist or a bomber as a more appropriate parallel for understanding the Tylenol, murderer. Huh. Interesting. Right. Well, and the Sterling saying these characteristics also apply to mass shooters and school shooters. Right. Very true. Right. What you're saying, the grievance, the grievance part. So that's a Tylenol. That's a Tylenol poisoner too. This does, in a peculiar way, this does look like a mass murderer. Yeah. It is. Well, it is. Right. Which is what it's gotten

people so confused. Right. So many people. In fact, one person that wasn't into this case when they learned how many people, that's when she got into it. She's like, wait, I had no idea with so many people. She thought it was the next husband. This is an entire lunch. Yeah, a entire lunch group, yeah. And a very close-knit people in a very small community. Again, this is a pastor of a well-known church. Here's a Facebook post by Aaron. I think this would, this provides a little insight. her personality. She's writing on Facebook. So one of the things Aaron did was she was involved in editing a community magazine or community

newsletter for years. She put this on Facebook, quote, I'm very good at details. That's why I'm good at proofreading, et cetera. I've been editing the community magazine for two years now, and I have to bring together articles written by illiterate expletive, illiterate MFs, and turn them into something. something legible. Whoa. Well, that says a lot. Right. So, right? I mean. Talk about vengeance. Talk about anger. And so if you're, by the way, if you're displaying this kind of anger and this kind of arrogance and disdain and abrasiveness publicly, right? Like she's willing to. Behind the scenes. Right. We all put on a facade

when it comes to our social media a bit, right? Like, or we just don't show, not a facade. I shouldn't say that. We all are careful with what we put out publicly. This is a statement by someone who has no friends and seemingly as a recluse. I mean, and again, this is a friend she made in a true crime group. I don't know how accurate it is, but let's go with it for the moment. We're speculating here. But for a supposed reclusive person to write something like that is extraordinary in the sense that she's really, you have to assume whatever she feels by herself or not in the public limelight is going to

a lot more severe. That quote is really interesting in the sense that there's obviously this there's this arrogance there too. There's a sense of superiority. So as I mentioned in Trestrell's research that this idea of an egotistical belief in one's mental superiority, right? You see that here. She knows she's smart. Yeah. Superiority complex. Yes. You see that with Kaczynski. You know, Kaczynski taught at MIT. So you have this sense that perhaps that in spite of the fact that she's drawing a lot of attention to her crime because she's killing multiple people at the same time, at the same lunch, that perhaps she thinks that she's disguised this well enough, that she can walk away

unscathed, that somehow she's going to avoid detection because she's the smartest one in the room. But the statement she writes on Facebook is fascinating, not only for the arrogance and the anger, but I also think there's a little bit of a reckless quality to it. In other words, like she's letting her anger damage her image to some degree, that she doesn't seem that concerned about her social standing or image to write something like that, right? And certainly in this lunch that she hosts,

there's a very reckless quality in the sense that she's not really thinking it through, that perhaps at the last moment she does change her mind to poison more people than she intended. You know, I don't know. All of this, it will be fascinating to see, as we learn more about evidence and details, it'll be fascinating to really kind of put this narrative together and to really develop a deeper understanding of it.

That is very, very telling. Another thing she said that I should mention that's important. August 16th, she made a statement to the Australian, which is a paper, I believe, a newspaper. where she said, she portrays herself as a bit of a victim. She says, quote, I've been painted as an evil witch. So on the one hand, I understand that's how she feels. The cases received a lot of scrutiny and people are pointing the finger at her.

And even in the clip we played, I did kind of feel bad for her in the sense that these reporters were hounding her at her home and they wouldn't leave her alone. I don't, you know, as you and I both know, there's always ethical issues about how, far to oppress people and how far to intrude to their lives, right? Like, those are important issues. So I get that she might feel like this. But I think, again, getting back to the importance of language, the question I have is, these are words she's choosing. Do these reflect in some way how she feels about herself?

Well, can we also talk about how it's interesting that her mother is into fairy tales? You said she has a background in fairy tales because wanting a fairy tale and not having no one and maybe even feeling like the witch in a fairy tale, too. I just... Yeah, right. That's, yeah, that's right. Her mother, that's interesting. Yeah, her mother specializes in kind of critiquing and historicizing children's literature,

which involves fairy tales. In fact, one of the articles I read had to do with how fairy tales are now quite different, how they're portrayed differently. Right. Hansel and Gretel, there's a witch. I mean, and oftentimes, you know, as children, we want to be the princess in the fairy tale. And here she is saying that she is the witch. I mean, it just goes, I'm just thinking about it. It goes with the whole scenario you painted too as far as motive, if she's angry,

that her life didn't go the way she wanted, that she wanted the fairy tale. And here is, here is Simon not giving her that. And now she is the witch in this fairy tale. If she becomes the witch, it's a transformation that she obviously brought upon herself. Clearly. Yeah, yeah, right. Yeah, no, that's, that's a really interesting point. This is someone who, I'm sure that both Aaron and her sister grew up reading a lot of fairy tales and being exposed to a lot of witches and a lot of these types of scenarios.

So I think we're, I think we're kind of nearing the end here. But I do want to mention that in Michael Farrell's book, which I mentioned earlier, which is the criminology of homicidal poisoning, Farrell points to one quality among poisoners that he feels like stands out above all others. and that is what he calls ruthlessness, that he believes that to poison someone and take their life that way is just absolutely ruthless and it lacks empathy. And it's the most horrific thing you can do to someone else. And I think that's interesting to think about here

because that quality would not be super apparent if you look at this crime. I mean, it would be in the sense that if this is deliberate and intentional and we can tie all this to murder, which clearly the Australian federal police believe they can do. But if this does result in a conviction, I think you'd have to, I might have to go back and kind of reevaluate some of the perceptions and whether she has empathy and whether that's all facade.

But perhaps it's worth thinking about, perhaps there's more ruthlessness here than seems apparent. Anyway, I just throw that out there. I don't know if that quality applies here, but it's the one quality that Michael Farrell kind of believes is a prominent characteristic of poisoners. So we're thinking about it. Yeah, I think that that's possible.

We realize that. We see that in her. Interesting. Well, we'll keep a tab on that then. What we have to be about Aaron Patterson. You certainly have to be ruthless to poison multiple people at the same lunch, same sitting. So for sure.

I want to end with a quote that's kind of food for thought. So if we think about this potentially as a crime of anger or resentment or revenge, I think this is something to think about. So this is from Escalis, who's the famous, well-known, ancient Greek tragedy in and playwright. Escalis says, quote, the poison of hatred seated near the heart doubles the burden for the one who suffers the disease. She is burdened with her own sorrow and groans unseen and others' happiness. So, bottom line, you know, hatred, revenge doesn't pay off. Usually doesn't pay off. But

nobody understood that as well, I think, is the Greek tragedians. And those are authors always come back to for insight and wisdom. So I thought I would end with that. And I think it's completely relevant to potentially relevant to this particular crime. Most people don't realize how much their personal information is being bought and sold every day. Data brokers are making billions, pulling details about you from public records and the internet, and then packaging and selling it, usually without your consent. That's how your information lands in the hands of scammers, spammers, even stalkers. It's why you get endless robocalls and why ads seem to follow you everywhere.

That's where ORA comes in. ORA actively removes your data from broker's sites and keeps it off. They also instantly alert you if your information shows up in a breach or on the dark web. But ORA goes beyond data protection. With one app, you get a VPN, antivirus, password manager, spam call protection, dark web monitoring, and even up to $5 million in identity theft insurance, all backed by 24-7 U.S.-based fraud support. Other companies might sell just credit monitoring, or just a VPN. ORA gives you all of it, together, at the same price competitors charge for just one.

one service. Start your free trial today atora.com slash remove. Protect yourself now atora.com slash remove.