RedHanded - Erin Patterson & The Mushroom Murders: Part One | #409

Episode Date: July 24, 2025

At lunchtime, a family in southeast Australia sat down for beef wellington with a mushroom duxelles, creamy mash and buttery green beans. The next morning, most of the guests would be violently ill. A week later, three of them would be dead. Only one diner was totally unaffected: the host, Erin Patterson… who later would stand trial for murder by poison mushroom.In part one of our post-trial evaluation of this case, we take a look back at that fateful lunch, and Erin’s increasingly evasive and bizarre behaviour in the weeks after it – all while her family members fought for their lives.The video version of this episode will be on our YouTube channel from 24th July.Exclusive bonus content:Wondery - Ad-free & ShortHandPatreon - Ad-free & Bonus EpisodesFollow us on social media:YouTubeTikTokInstagramVisit our website:WebsiteSources available on redhandedpodcast.comSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondry Plus subscribers can listen to Red Handed early and ad free. Join Wondry Plus in the Wondry app or on Apple podcasts. Agent Nate Russo returns in Oracle 3 Murder at the Grandview, the latest installment of the gripping Audible original series. When a reunion at an abandoned island hotel turns deadly, Russo must untangle accident from murder. But beware, something sinister lurks in the grand view's shadows. Joshua Jackson delivers a bone-chilling performance in the supernatural thriller that will keep you on the edge of your seat. Don't let your

fears take hold of you as you dive into this addictive series. Love thrillers with a paranormal twist? The entire Oracle trilogy is available on Audible. Listen now on Audible. If you're overwhelmed by the news cycle, let us help you with that. I'm Cormac McSweeney. I'm Gurdip Alawalia. And I'm Melanie Ng. At The Big Story, we slow the news down and examine one big story in depth.

Something that matters. To give you some clarity amidst the chaos. Join us along with our team of award-winning journalists on The Big Story. Available every weekday morning. Listen on the Seeker app or wherever you get your podcasts. Business Wars gives you a front row seat to the biggest moments in business

and how they shape our world. From boardroom blowups to strategies gone wrong. These are the stories behind the headlines. Listen to Business Wars on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Saruti. I'm Hannah. And welcome to Red Handed, where, if you don't know, this entire episode, and part two of this, because yes, it is going to be a two-parter, are being fully video recorded and will be uploaded to our YouTube channel. Aren't you lucky? Look at us doing what we're told.

I know. We're really trying to embrace this whole video first podcasting situation. So this episode and next week's just felt like they warranted video facial reactions to things that are going to happen. So if you are listening to the audio version of this, you can carry on. That's absolutely up to you. That is your right as a podcast listener. But if you are like, hey, hey, hey, I want to watch these two say these things, head on over immediately to the Red-Handed YouTube channel, link in the episode description,

and watch us instead. We'll be here whether you do or not. Absolutely. And one more plug before we get started, because if you are listening to this, the week of release as you should be, then last Monday, Monday the 14th of July, was the release date, general release date, of our brand new limited series, Flesh and Code. It's great. That should be enough for you.

You should just take my word for it. Yeah. Very unfortunately for me. So if you don't know about Flesh and Kodas, it's about AI and how it can steal your job and your wife. The day it was released on Wondry+, my friend got made redundant because of AI. Yeah. I know. And if you're like, I don't care about AI stealing people's jobs. Don't worry. The main thing is stealing your wife.

That's not what Flesh and Kodat is about. But it's very difficult. Yeah. To be like, hey, listen to this. Yeah. Yeah. So if that hasn't happened to you, then go listen to Flesh and Coat because it is basically Hannah and I, over the course of six episodes and two bonus episodes, exploring how AI, human, sexual, romantic relationships are a blossoming. Exactly and how we, even though we shouldn't, we can't help ourselves trying to... Fuck everything. Fuck everything, yep. And also trying to solve unsolvable human problems with technology.

Quite absolutely. And it is such a fascinating story. It centers around one man, Travis, and his relationship with an AI companion called Lily Rose, but we do branch off into lots of other people. We look at also the creator, the founder of the particular app that they use. And there's all sorts of crazy stuff. Like, I mean, we're talking like Russian propaganda, shenanigans, the founder of the particular app that they use. And there's all sorts of crazy stuff like, I mean, we're talking like Russian propaganda, shenanigans, the ethics of all of this, attempted assassinations of the late Queen of England. There's lots going on. So

go and check out Flesh and Code wherever you listen to your podcasts and we'll be there. We will be there. But right now we're not going to talk about robots. We're going to talk about robots. We're going to talk about mushrooms. Finally. Finally. This has been bubbling away inside of me for quite some time and I am ready to let loose. Let's get on with it. On the 29th of July, 2023, in the small town of Lee and Gartha, in the Latrobe Valley, around 80 miles

southeast of Melbourne, a family gathered for lunch. Steaming hot plates of beef wellington, creamy mash and buttery green beans were piled up and passed around as the group got settled in. But by the following morning, most of the guests would be violently ill. And just a week later, three of the party would be dead and one would be left fighting for his life. And by the end of the year, the hostess with the mostess, Erin Patterson, would be arrested on suspicion of murder. The question for everyone was, what had happened? Was Erin Patterson the most ordinary-seeming, middle-aged mother of two

you could possibly ever imagine? A cold-blooded killer? Or was it, as she claimed, an honest mistake caused by contaminated ingredients? I'm a taxi. But if so, then why did Erin lie again and again and again to authorities? It's the case that rocked Australia and made headlines all over the world. It's an almost medieval or Shakespearean story of family destruction. And although we did cover this story quite a while ago, I think maybe at least a year

ago now over on Patreon, the Australian legal system being very similar to the UK's meant that there wasn't mushroom speculation on our part. I know it's so gross. How do you feel about that? I hate myself, but also, but also I was going to do it. So now, on what is very nearly actually the two year anniversary of this nightmare lunch, now that the whopping 10 week trial is finally over, and spoilers, Aaron Patterson has been found guilty on three counts of murder and one of attempted murder. We decided it

was time for a full blow-by-blow of exactly what went on around that table and kind of why. And I left my laptop at home because I'm a stupid idiot. So I'm reading off my phone, I do apologize. In 2023, 48-year-old Erin Patterson was having a rough year. Her relationship with her estranged husband Simon had progressively become worse. And now she was having some serious health concerns.

So Erin had decided to invite Simon, his parents, her in-laws, who are called Don and Gail, and Gail's sister Heather and Heather's husband Ian Wilkinson over for lunch. According to the Pattersons and the Wilkinsons, Erin had told them that she'd recently received some bad medical news and she needed help with how she was going to break it to her and Simon's two kids. They all assumed the worst since the month before Erin had told them that she'd found a lump on her elbow. She said that she'd had a biopsy and an MRI and she was just waiting

for the results. But the night before the lunch, Simon texted Erin saying that he felt uncomfortable coming over and he did follow up with texted Erin saying that he felt uncomfortable coming over. And he did follow up with a message stating that he would be more than happy to have a phone call with her to discuss her health issues. But that he just wasn't going to be joining them next day for lunch. Yeah. And Erin, on receiving this message, was not happy. She replied, telling Simon that she'd worked extremely hard preparing this lunch. To be fair, I believe I made this

point when we did the Patreon episode. Wellingtons are very very difficult. I believe you. Not the way I think Erin made them, which we will come on to, but I absolutely take your point that a beef Wellington is a dish that you make to really like show those people that they are special. Oh yeah, like if you pull off a Wellington. Mm-hmm. But I would say what she actually made

are more like pasties, but we'll get there. I promise you. Did she make her own pastry? I don't know. That is a question I actually don't know the answer to. Because if she did, I'm impressed. I don't know if she made that, but again, hold onto your hats on the Wellington front, because this is what she did I'm impressed. I don't know if she made that. But again, hold on to your hats on the Wellington front because this is what Erin Tech Simon-Bach

said. She spent her fortune on ribeye steaks which she was going to use to make beef. Wellingtons to make the lunch special. I know, I know, I know. Hannah, you included and anybody listening, watching at home is going to be like, what the fuck you on about ribeye steaks if you're making a Wellington? I promise you I will get to it. The marbling's all wrong for a start. So she also explained in this text message to Simon that she was not happy that he was deciding not to come because she might not be able to do something like this again for

quite some time, given her recent news. And Erin reiterated in these text messages to her estranged husband Simon that it was very important that they all attend the lunch the next day. But Simon still didn't show up. Erin, however, was not going to let that ruin her party. When the rest of the group arrived, as planned at 12.30, Erin showed them around the house because Ian and Heather, Simon's aunt and uncle, had actually never been to the house before. So she shows them around and then she served up lunch. So the group grabbed their food, dished up by Erin, and then they all tucked in. Ian, Heather and Dawn all cleared their plates. Gail only managed to

eat about half of her wellington, but her husband Don was very happy to help her out. The group then finished off with some orange cake that Gail had brought with her and a fruit platter courtesy of Heather. Then, according to Ian Wilkinson, Erin told them all that she had ovarian cancer and she needed surgery and then chemotherapy. Obviously, it was incredibly worrying news, but Don, Gail, Heather and Ian all assured Erin that they would do whatever they could to help her and support her through this. Together, they also prayed for Erin. Ian is after all the local pastor. And they advised Erin to just be honest with her children. The conversation was cut short when Erin's son came home with a friend. He chatted to the guests for a bit before, teenager or

a Lee, running off to his room to play video games. After the lunch, everybody left in pretty good spirits, despite the sad news. But by midnight, things had taken a turn. All four of the guests were sick, struggling with intense diarrhea and vomiting. Simon got a call from his father Don the following morning at 8.45. Don told his son that he and Gail were having a really bad time, and that he'd actually called an ambulance. According to Don, Ian and Heather were ill too,

so Simon drove to his aunt and uncle's house to check on them. And it was immediately clear to Simon that they both needed urgent Medica attention. So he quickly bundled them into his car and drove Ian and Heather straight to Leongartha Hospital. On the way, Simon's aunt Heather asked him why Erin had eaten her lunch of a different colour plate to the ones they had. Did she have a shortage of crockery? To which Simon, probably at the time, putting this strange question down to his aunt being

dehydrated and confused because she's been sick all night, simply replied, yes, maybe. It is an odd thing to notice. Yeah. Before the internet ruled our lives, AOL brought America online with email and instant message. By 2000, AOL was so powerful, it bought media giant Time Warner. This was a deal that was supposed to bring us into the future Revolutionized media, but instead it became one of the messiest corporate disasters in history

So what went wrong the dot-com crash culture clashes or something deeper? business wars gives you a front-row seat to the biggest moments in business and how they shape our world because when your flight perks disappear, your favorite restaurant chain goes bankrupt or new tech threatens to reshape everything overnight, you can bet there's a deeper story behind the headlines. Make sure to follow Business Wars on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcast and you can binge all episodes of Business Wars, theOL Time Warner Disaster early and ad-free right now on Wondery Plus. All right, very quick break because I know you are gagging to get back to this particular

episode but we have to tell you a little bit about what's going on on Patreon this week. Certainly. Well, this week we have Under the Duvet where I explain how hypnosis works badly, but it works. It does work. And I will tell you how I came off the pill and now the back knee's back. We also have a little chat about Russell Brand and contemplate the composition of the soul and whether it even fucking matters.

And then I do a little review on a throwback dating TV show that I watched on Channel 4 called Perfect Match where I literally couldn't believe, A, that people were smoking in clubs because it's that old and then all the horrific things that were coming out of people's mouths. And you can listen to all of that over on Patreon and you can watch it too under the duvet is every week we release it every Wednesday morning and also on Patreon you can get red-ed totally ad free and we also do monthly bonus episodes and you can find all of that at patreon.com forward slash red handed initially the suspicion at the hospital was that the four unfortunate patients had been victims of food poisoning. Beef perhaps. It's quite difficult to get

food poisoned by beef. It's not like chicken. It's complicated because it's like, what could it be? And I think they're just like, it's got to be food poisoning because they all ate the same thing. And that makes the most sense. Whatever it is that's causing it is a question mark. But food poisoning seems the best bet because it's what they all did together that day. But as the doctors watched Ian, Gail, Don and Heather rapidly deteriorated. We're talking acute liver failure and multiple organs shutting down within hours. So the doctors thought that it might have to be something a bit more than food poisoning. All four of them had eaten beef Wellingtons containing mushrooms. And the symptoms that they were exhibiting fit

with something like death cap poisoning, which is pretty amazing work. That's like an episode of House. Honestly, Chris Webster, Dr. Chris Webster, who is going to become a big player in these two episodes. Remarkable work, honestly, for him to pinpoint, put his finger that quickly, when he's being presented with four sick people, to identify that quickly, death cap poisoning, remarkable. And sure, like the land down under does have a bit of reputation for being entirely populated

by things that are going to kill you, but death cap mushrooms are very rare in Australia. In the past 40 years, they have only been six known deaths. Five humans, one spaniel. But even given that death cap poisoning is so rare in Australia, Dr Chris Webster was convinced that that is what he was looking at and he told the family that he needed to speak to whoever had cooked those Wellingtons as soon as possible. So Simon called Erin to tell her what was going on. He explained that everyone from the lunch had been hospitalized and asked her how she was doing. Erin said that she had had a bad tummy as well and that she was going to come into the hospital to get an IV.

So yeah, during that call that Simon, Erin's estranged husband makes to her, because he's at the hospital with his mom and dad, his aunt and his uncle, he doesn't mention the mushroom theory, he just says, are you okay? Because everyone else is really sick. We're all in the Leongatha hospital here. Like are you coming in? are you okay? Because everyone else is really sick. We're all in the Leongatha hospital here. Like, are you coming in? Are you okay? They kind of want to also check you out.

They want to speak to you. And that's when she's like, oh yeah, I am going to come in. I need to get an IV. So when Erin arrives at the hospital, she sat in the waiting room and Dr. Webster on hearing that she has arrived, rushes out into the waiting room to speak to her urgently. And he told Erin, apparently, that he had been waiting to speak to her, waiting for her to come in.

And according to Dr. Chris Webster, she seemed visibly shocked and uncomfortable when he said that to her. And she told him, I'm just a gastrocase. It's nothing urgent. It's no big deal. The doctor then questioned her on how she was feeling and on where she got the mushrooms for the lunch from. He specifically says that to her. And Dr. Chris Webster stressed to Aaron Patterson that if this was indeed death cap poisoning the situation was incredibly time-sensitive. On hearing this Aaron got the fuck out of there as fast as she humanly could. And soon after

Aaron liked it Dr Chris Webster made the following call to potentially exposed to a fatal toxin from the address of the patients. If you know where they are, their address. I have the address of the patients. Go ahead with that. Okay, 84 Gibson, G-I-B-S-O-N Street. Is that in Leongatha? Leongatha 3953. Thank you.

So 84 Gibson Street, Leongatha, Victoria. The nearest intersection is Worthy Street, is that correct? Um, I'd have to get Google Maps up, but yes, I would say that sounds right, that sounds like a straight and lean guess. What's her name? So the last name is Patterson, T-A-T-T-E-R-S-O-M. First name? Erin E-R-I-M.

Do you have her date of birth? 30th of September 1974. When did she present at hospital? At 8.05. Today? Yep. The mushroom poisoning you said? Yes, so there were five people that ate a meal on Saturday and two of them are in intensive care at Dandenong Hospital.

Two have just been transferred from Leongathal Hospital to Dandenong Hospital and Erin presented this morning with symptoms of poisoning. So yeah, I think that call is very, very important because it paints a picture of the real urgency that the doctors had at the time. And I think you can tell in that call that Chris Webster is saying that he found Erin's behavior to be strange, to be unusual. Why has she discharged herself against medical advice when the nurses started observations after he asked her where the mushrooms had come from?

And why is she uncontactable when he told her you're telling me you're sick I'm telling you you may have been exposed to a deadly toxin that has currently put at least two people in intensive care and is eventually going to kill three of them why would you leave and I think it shows that this didn't become something strange that doctors and nurses thought about in hindsight. At the time, her behaviour was strange. And when you listen to that call, it feels like Erin, who had come into the hospital to seek medical attention, according to her, ran out pretty much as soon as doctors started questioning her on where

the mushrooms had come from. And they're at no stage in that interaction, they're not accusing her of anything. They're just asking her. It hasn't even crossed their mind. They're like, oh, actually, you could be really ill and we need to help you. Absolutely. They are just on a mission to understand and save lives. That's what they're trying to do.

And she comes in again, I can't stress this enough. She comes into the hospital voluntarily saying she needs an IV because she says, I have been sick and having diarrhea all night. But as soon as they say, where did the mushrooms come from? She checks herself out. You know, she wasn't tricked into coming to the hospital. She chose to come. So why did she leave before she could get the IV?

So yeah, just interesting things to think about. Because I really think what happened here is that Erin thought, okay, they're all in hospital. I'll go down there too. I'll put on a bit of an act of, you know, being sick and make out that we've all had a touch of this food poisoning. I'll get an IV and then, you know, happy days. I do not think for one second she thought or expected Dr. Webster to start talking to her about mushrooms.

I think it freaked her out completely when he says to her, where did you get these mushrooms? I think it completely freaked her out because I don't think she thought that anybody would be onto the true cause of these illnesses that quickly. Yeah, I agree. So Erin had told the nurses that she needed to leave, saying that she had to go home to feed her animals and pack a ballet bag for her daughter. And like, okay. You've just been told by doctors that you may have been exposed to a deadly toxin, and

apparently according to you, you don't feel very well. Why would you leave? That's one of the biggest questions. She says she's ill and they're like, we think you've been poisoned with death cap mushrooms and she's like, But the ballet bag. I have to go. I have to leave.

And there's even CCTV footage that we've seen since the trial of just how forceful Erin's exit was from the hospital. So yeah, for our not viewers, Erin is stood by the door looking visibly quite agitated. And there's a nurse trying to speak to her and also sort of trying to block her path. The nurse even reaches out to try and touch Erin on the arm, clearly trying to convince her to stay, but Erin is just not having it. Shaking her head and pushing the release door button. Yeah, she just looks so standoffish. She's just like, no, no, don't touch me. Don't want to be here. I want to get out of here. And she's like pressing that release door button.

She's looking for any way to get out. She looks like a cornered animal, like someone who just wants to be anywhere except in this hospital. And I cannot imagine having that feeling if I had just been told that the reason I might be feeling sick is because I've been exposed to poison and the doctors and nurses are trying to help me. Yeah. So yeah, in the CCTV footage, and this is, I love, I just love this

bit because this is like internet sleuthing at its best. I mean, it's barely sleuthing internet observations at its best. Because for some reason this is never brought up at trial, but everybody talks about it on the internet and it is such a good point. Erin is in the CCTV footage wearing white trousers. Come on. You are gonna tell me, lady, that you have been up all night with diarrhea, you've been vomiting, your stomach is, you know, all over the place, ill enough that you

need to come to hospital to get an IV. And she says to Dr. Chris Webster when she's in the waiting room, I'm just a gastrocase. What sort of fucking gastrocase walks around wearing white trousers? Could you imagine such a thing? She's not on her period and it's not a bloody Tampax ad. I do not believe it for a second. It is unimaginable that that would be the case. Kind of like a weird inverse of like when you're when you're a kid and your mom's

like well you have to put clean pants on because if you get hit by a bus and you've got dirty knickers on that'll be really embarrassing. Yeah. Which I think is such an odd thing to say to children. I know. The only reason to keep up your personal hygiene is if you die. And someone judges you from the coroner's slab. But no, it reminds me of that line from The Thick of It when Malcolm Tucker is like screaming at the MPs and he's like, come in tomorrow wearing brown colour trousers and a blood red top because I'm going to eviscerate you. And it's like this woman has chosen to do quite the exact opposite. So yeah, she's apparently, you know, been sick all night and had diarrhea all morning. A morning

in which, by the way, we would later discover that she had taken her son on a 140-kilometer round-trip drive so that he could go to a flying lesson that he had booked him. And she had done that again whilst being very unwell, whilst having diarrhea and again whilst wearing those same white trousers. So yeah. Anyway, the baffled nurses realized they can't keep Erin there against her will. They try their best as you can see in that CCTV footage but they can't like strap her to a bed. Or they can't section her for having the shirts. Or they can't like section her for having the shits. Exactly. So they make it clear to Erin, okay you can leave, but they said to her, you need to be back within 40 minutes.

Because they told her, you have almost certainly been exposed to a deadly toxin. And they said she needed to be tested, she needed to be monitored, and she needed to be given something to protect her liver. Which is where they were seeing the acute failure in the other four patients. So they let her go. They say come back in 40 minutes, but Erin wouldn't come back to the hospital for nearly two hours. And when she did come back, she claimed that she was so late because she'd gone home and fallen asleep.

And now that she was back, she told medical staff, oh, I actually feel fine. I actually feel right as rain. The magic of a nap. So don't worry, yeah, quite. You know, maybe I've been poisoned by deathcats like everybody else seems to have been, but I went home, had a little nap, and now I'm fine. So don't worry. It's actually been quite dramatic. Erin also dropped the bombshell that she'd given her children the leftovers from the previous day's lunch and they were completely fine. Just like she is. The doctors were shocked and they told Erin in no uncertain terms that she needed to get her children and bring them to the hospital now. But Erin was reluctant. She said that her kids hadn't eaten the mushroom paste

because they didn't like mushrooms. So she'd scrape the duck cell and the pastry off and just given her kids the beef and the beans and the mash. So there was no need for the children to come to the hospital and scare them for no reason. And the doctor said, do you want scared kids or dead ones? Chris Webster's not fucking about. No. So Erin had no choice. And she brought her kids in. And thankfully, the tests on the two children and Erin all showed that they were fine.

They had normal everything. Normal blood pressure, normal bloods, normal livers, normal pulses, normal temperatures. Absolutely everything was fine. So all three of them were discharged. And this, again, I think is very, very interesting. Firstly, can I just say, who eats a meal, gets sick with suspected food poisoning, because that's remember what Erin herself claims. She says they eat the meal on Saturday, and then she is not feeling well all of Saturday night and Sunday morning. Who then gives that same meal to their children?

Because you don't know what's causing the food poisoning, but it must be something in that meal. If that's the last thing you ate and then you got sick, why would you give that same meal to your kids? That seems a bit weird to me. I take your point that like it's quite hard to get food poisoning from beef. But surely if it were me, then the most likely culprit from that Saturday afternoon meal would have been the meat. That's what I would have thought. I would have thought I've got some bad meat. Maybe the fridge didn't work.

Maybe there's something in it. Mad cow disease. I don't know. Something has caused us to get sick. It's probably not the potatoes. Probably not the fucking beans. you know, the pastry and you know, it's just some fucking duck cell, like you're gonna think it's the meat, that's gonna be the most likely scenario. Yet when the doctors asked Erin to bring the kids in, she says she wasn't worried about them

because she'd scraped the mushrooms off the leftovers and given it to them. And yes, look, the doctors had said to Erin at this point that they were worried about mushroom poisoning, but they don't know that it is mushroom poisoning yet. Nobody knows that. That is just a theory. No tests have been done at this point to confirm that it was the mushrooms that it was definitely death cat poisoning. So it still could have been the meat.

It still could have been anything. And those kids had eaten everything apart from the pastry and the mushrooms. So as an innocent outside bystander who maybe doesn't know how beef food poisoning presents itself, I would still be convinced that it was the meat that was causing this problem. Yet Erin is so sure, despite the fact that nobody in that hospital really knows what's making everybody sick, she is willing to take that much of a risk with her kids and say they can't possibly need to come in because they didn't eat the mushrooms. How would you know that that's what's causing it?

Right. And what sort of mother would take such a risk? Well, this is what, yeah, that's what I was going to say. Like, people are wicked dumb. I know that. I know that in my heart and my soul. I just am not convinced that anybody would see family members hospitalized after eating something and then give that same thing to their children. I just don't believe that. The whole thing makes no sense. Even if you didn't know about the hospitalizations, the fact that you feel unwell after eating that meal makes it highly suspect to me that you would feed it to your children. And also the fact that those children have eaten essentially four-sixths of the same meal that has now hospitalized their grandparents, why would you take the

word of those doctors who are only saying we suspect mushroom poisoning to say, well, they're fine because they didn't eat the mushrooms. Because you don't fucking know it's not the beef. It just boggles my mind that she would have been so willing to take such a risk with her children if she didn't know that the problem was indeed the mushrooms and that she didn't actually feed her kids those fucking leftovers. The kids say they ate leftovers, but like she could have just bought more fucking steak and made them the same meal, going nowhere near the duck cells that were in the beef Wellington. Because her point is, I scraped it off and gave it to them.

I don't believe that for a second. No. It's all a lighthearted nightmare on our podcast, Morbid. We're your hosts. I'm Alina Urquhart. And I'm Ash Kelly. And our show is part true crime, part spooky, and part comedy. The stories we cover are well researched. Of the 880 men who survived the attack, around 400 would eventually find their way to one another and merge into one larger group. With a touch of humor, Shout out to her.

Shout out to all my therapists out there, there's been like eight of them. A dash of sarcasm and just garnished a bit with a little bit of cursing. That mother f***er is not real! And if you're a weirdo like us and love to cozy up to a creepy tale of the paranormal, Or you love to hop in the way back machine and dissect the details of some of history's most notorious crimes, you should tune in to our podcast, Morbid. Follow Morbid on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to episodes early and ad free by joining Wondery Plus and the Wondery app

or on Apple podcasts. Hey, I'm Mike Corey, the host of Wondery's podcast Against the Odds. In each episode, we take you to the edge of some of the most incredible adventure and survival stories in history. In our next season, it's 1912, the golden age of Antarctic exploration, with countries racing to claim land and glory. Australian geologist Douglas Mawson sets off with two fellow explorers and a team of huskies to venture deep into uncharted territory. They face a harsh landscape with hidden crevasses,

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that the four other diners were getting significantly worse. Ian, Don, Heather and Gail weren't responding to treatment anymore and they were rushed to urgent care at the Monash Medical Centre in Melbourne. Meanwhile, the doctors probed Erin further. They needed to know exactly what mushrooms she had used and where she had got them from. Erin told them that she'd made the duck cell for the Wellingtons from a mix of button, shiitake and dried puccini mushrooms. And she said that she'd got the fresh ones from a woolly's and the dried ones from an Asian supermarket. With the Patissons and the Wilkinsons now

in a critical condition, and mushroom poisoning high on the list of concerns, at 5.30pm on the 31st of July the doctors called Professor Rhonda Stewart, a Director of Infection Prevention and Epidemiology at Monash Health. And look, pretty much as soon as she gets that call and they explain the situation to her, Professor Ronda is terrified because she is scared that this is going to turn into a major public health risk. Because Erin is there claiming that she had bought these mushrooms from a shop, from an Asian supermarket.

So if there was a shop out there, wittingly or unwittingly, selling poisonous mushrooms to the public, this could well be just the start of some sort of large-scale catastrophe. So imagine Professor Rondo's shock when she found Erin Patterson incredibly reluctant to talk to her. All Erin would really say to Professor Rondo was that she had cooked the beef wellingtons to make the meals special and that she had followed a recipe from the cookbook, Recipe Tin Eats by a chef called Nagi Mihashi, who is actually, fun fact, currently embroiled in another crime-y case of her own where she's accused another chef, a woman named Brooke Bellamy, of plagiarising her caramel slice and back-lubber recipes. Serious business. This just popped into my head and I can't help myself. Did you know

that jelly babies used to be called unclaimed babies? Oh my god. And they're like made in the image of like when people would like leave babies on the church steps. That's fucked. Isn't it just fucked? That's hilarious also though. Wow. Oh god. So yes, she tells Professor Rhonda this kind of like seemingly useless information. And then she says that she had been so shocked when she'd heard that everyone had been hospitalized and that she had rushed her kids into the hospital to get them checked out since they'd eaten the leftovers, conveniently leaving out the part where she'd actually been forced

to bring her kids into the hospital by her husband Simon and the doctors. When it came to the topic of the mushrooms, Erin said that she couldn't actually remember quite exactly where she'd bought the dried ones. Yeah, she's just very vague. It was an Asian supermarket. She said that it had been months since she had purchased the mystery mushrooms and she got them originally for a carbonara but thought they smelled a bit too strong. Carbonara doesn't have mushrooms in it.

Can do. Can do. Not dried ones though. That's disgusting. Anyway, the mushrooms were from an Asian supermarket but it could have been in Glen Waverley, Mount Waverley, Clayton or in Oakley. Erin said that she drove around a lot during the summer holidays taking the kids to various activities so the mushrooms could have come from anywhere. She just couldn't remember. According to Erin, she also must have paid for the mushrooms in cash because quite conveniently she had no electronic proof

of the payment for the dried mushrooms. She's also immediately confusing her story here because she's giving all the names of these various suburbs, right? She's saying that she bought them months ago, but then she's also saying she drove around a lot that summer and that she has like a bolt hole house in like another suburb. So it could have been while I was staying there, but if she'd bought them months ago, she didn't buy them in the summer. So she wouldn't have been driving the kids around to all of their various activities. Like nothing she's saying already makes any real sense. And despite the fact that Erin couldn't remember anything about where the mushrooms had come

from, she did give a very detailed description of what the bag looked like. She said it was a clear bag with a handwritten label and that it weighed 100 grams. It doesn't have the bag anymore, to be clear. Right. So how do you remember the weight and the look of the bag, but you can't remember where you bought them? During this initial conversation, Professor Rhonda also asked Erin if she'd been mushrooming. Which I assume doesn't mean taking magic mushrooms. Correct. Is it foraging for them? Good guess. I guess that anyone I think could make, but Erin would later claim she didn't

know what she meant by that. Erin said that she hadn't been mushrooming. She'd never been mushrooming. Not once in her life. Beg's a question as well. Like I said, we will come back to the fact that she will later say when she's asked about this that she didn't know what mushrooming meant. Why wouldn't you ask then? Why would you say no? If you asked me, have you ever been mushrooming and I wasn't sure what that meant, I'd be like, what do you mean by that? Not no? And my family are dying. Yeah, there's also that.

And Professor Ronda was panicking at this point. She really needed to figure out which shop was selling the death mushrooms quite quickly. And that's not just like out of the goodness of her heart, like that's her job. If people die, that's her fault. Yes, absolutely. And here is a woman, here is a witness who could potentially tell her where these fucking mushrooms had come from, But she seems incredibly vague about the whole situation. So Professor Ronda basically tells her to go home and have a think about where those mushrooms had come from. She even says to her, like, even if you can just narrow it down to a few particular streets

where you maybe regularly go to Asian supermarkets, even if you can remember a landmark nearby the day that you were holding that bag, that bag of mushrooms that you vividly remember in your hand. Even if you don't remember the name of the shop, give me something that will help us find out where it came from. And while Aaron went home to think about it, an officer from public health had already hit the streets of the various suburbs that Aaron had mentioned. This officer visited every single Asian and independent supermarket he could find and

started documenting all of their dried mushroom selections. But none of them at all matched the description that Aaron had given. He couldn't find anywhere a bag that was 100 grams. All of them are like 30 grams at most, like small bags of dried mushrooms. And none of them have like handwritten labels or anything like that. And so they just take a picture. He just takes a picture of all of the different bags that he finds, all of the different shop fronts that he visits, all of the different streets that he goes to. And these are sent to Erin in a hope that something might lodge a memory loose for her. But she is incredibly

infuriatingly vague still and just says that she doesn't recognise any of them. And that was when they could get her to talk at all. Because for the next few days, Erin failed to return multiple increasingly urgent calls, texts and voicemails from Professor Rhonda. And I read the transcripts of these calls, right? She is like, please, Erin, call me, call me. Where did you get these mushrooms? Can you tell me what else was in the meal? You said there were shallots. Where did you get the shallots? So she's looking at every possibility and she's repeatedly calling her and saying, this is urgent. This is urgent. And Erin doesn't go back to her or she if she does, she'll text her saying,

sorry, busy with the kids, we'll get back to you tonight. Doesn't get back to her. Like, it's stonewalling. All the while, Gail, Heather, Ian and Don were crashing. Doctors gave Don a liver transplant, but it didn't work. Gail was too ill for a transplant, and Heather already had major bowel and liver damage. During one of her lucid moments, Heather asked Simon again why had Erin had a different colour plate to the rest of them. According to Heather, they'd all eaten off large grey plates, and Erin had used a small

tan plate. Simon again said that he didn't know. Erin did have mismatched crockery. Maybe that was all she had for a group of five. And we just don't know why this stood out to Heather so much that early on. Could it be that she noticed because Heather already suspected that something dodgy was going on? I have to say, I would notice that. Yeah. But the fact that she asks twice. And because she is in hospital dying, it screams to me that immediately, because she asks Simon that when he goes to get her from her house that morning. I'm like, why did she already think that something nefarious was going on? It's really weird. And we don't have the answer. We don't have the answer

to that because Heather's dead. But like, yeah, I do not know why Heather already had doubts about this. It also drives me absolutely up the wall. There were five of us until dad died, lol. And it used to drive me absolutely nuts that placemats came in sets of four. So there was always an odd one and it drove me up the wall. Yeah, plates, cutlery, lots of things come, yeah, absolutely, in fours. So I could understand, of course, you have people over, you'ves. So I could understand, of course, you have people over, you've only got four matching plates, you take the small shit one, because you want your guests to have the nice plates. And you know, if three people hadn't died

and one person spent like fucking months in a coma after, wouldn't think twice about it. I'm not fucking snob. I'll eat off whatever plate you fucking give me as long as it doesn't smell like eggs. She will sniff it. I will sniff it. Just rinse it in cold water before you give me utensils or plates. For the love of God. But yeah, I do not know why Heather was already suspicious. It is barely retrospective. It's like literally the morning after, but sadly we'll never know. So yeah, by this point it had become pretty clear to the doctors that Gail, Don and Heather were not going to survive.

And despite the doctors throwing everything at them, they all continued to deteriorate. Five days after the lunch, sisters Gail and Heather both died on the 4th of August. Followed the next day by dawn. Ian Wilkinson was the only one still hanging on. He was put into a medically induced coma and it would be seven more weeks before he finally woke up. Only to learn that he had had an incredibly lucky escape. But tragically, that his wife and his brother and sister-in-law were all dead. It's just so, so like, unbelievably heartbreaking. Like he spends two months in

a coma, wakes up and they're just like, yeah, your life is shattered. Your beloved wife of like five decades is dead. Yeah. And we still don't know exactly why. I think I'd ask to be re-combed. Put me back under and wake me up when it's finished. But one person who didn't seem all that genuinely heartbroken was Erin Patterson. Because soon after the deaths, Erin was questioned on the street outside her house by a journalist who just so happened to kind of get her at that right moment. We are going to watch the video together because it's not very long, but in my opinion, it is very telling.

So feel free to react as we're watching it because I think you'll find it incredibly hard not to, but let's save our thoughts, feelings and commentary for the other side. So again, if you are listening to this episode and you wish to continue doing that, you will obviously hear the audio, but if you want to watch Erin's face doing the things that it does, then please come on over to the YouTube channel where you can watch us reacting to this. It's a tragedy what's happened. Can you tell us about the meal that you caused?

I'm so devastated by what's happened, but the loss of Donnie, Donnie's still in hospital, the loss of Ian and Heather and Gail and some of the best people that I've ever met. Gail was 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 and I'm so devastated about what's happened. Can you tell us a bit? And the loss to the community and to the families and to my own children who've lost their grandmother. I'm sorry we've got to pause because I think there's too much and I don't want to, I don't basically want to get to the end and try play catch up on all the things that we've heard.

Okay. Firstly, lots of eye rubbing. Yeah, quite a dry face you've got there, Erin. Yeah, she even checks her own hand to see if there's a tear on it. There isn't. There isn't because there's lots of lots and lots and lots of wiping but absolutely no tears that I can see. And I don't, maybe this is just me. I don't know if you know but I'm white. When I cry I go bright red. Just normal colour isn't't she? Yeah, I'd say so. So yeah, lots of things to point out. Firstly, absolutely. I think

the visible, like, is she really crying? The lack of redness, the lack of tears. I think they are absolutely crucial. I just don't think they are things. I know we say all the time, like, nobody really knows how somebody's going to react when they're in a grief-stricken time. I stand by that. I agree. But she is not acting in a way that's like she's not crying and they were saying that's odd. She is pretending this is a performance. That's what it seems like. And I also think, okay, look at her body language, right? The way her arms are down by her side, the way she's acting, the way she's standing. I'm sorry, if I'm crying, you're like, curled in on yourself.

You're trying to protect yourself. There's some self-hugging, there's some like self-protection. There's some like to turn yourself away, to hold yourself almost. She's standing almost like she's standing up there giving a performance, like she's singing a fucking tragic opera. Why the arms by the side? Like that almost feels quite unusual to me. And if you're standing like that and you are crying, you're not giving into it. You're trying as hard as you can for it not to be happening. But that's inconsistent with her warbling. And she kind of puts on, I feel like this

quite childlike voice when she's doing it. It's quite like, oh, oh, oh, it just doesn't, her body language, the way that her face is coming across, the lack of tears, but the voice she's making and the warbling, the kind of like, the, the like, what's the word? It's not like vocal fry, but you know, when you're crying and your voice like shakes, those are all there. It's like she's doing the voice of how she thinks somebody sounds when they're crying, but it's not matching up with the physical appearance, I believe. So there's that. People can refute that. You can say that kind of thing. People are different. And she is a weird person. She is a weird person.

Yeah. And you know, weird people are everywhere. Sure. I'm right here. And I don't doubt that there is a world where an innocent person would do something like that. Quite. It's just not this one. I also think it's quite interesting within the first minute of this interaction, it sounds to me like she's putting forward an alibi. She's immediately saying, they never did anything wrong to me. They were wonderful to me. And also my mum died. My mum died. Feel sorry for me. It's a lot. Me, me, me, me, me.

It's all about her. There's so much that is about her. What she has lost, what her kids have lost. Again, it sounds like an outburst. Why would I kill them? My kids have lost their loving grandparents. I loved Gail and Don. They were so good to me. They never did anything to me. What? So if they had done something to you, would it be okay for you to have killed them? Like, do you know what I mean? It feels like she's building this alibi against anybody who could suspect her of being like, well, I couldn't possibly, why would I kill them?

They never did anything to me. I love them. My kids love them. Why is that what you're saying? You know, I just don't feel the real empathy here for the victims. It feels like it's about her, which even if you believe Erin's story, that all she did was cook this special meal for her loved ones and ended up killing them. Why is there no more guilt and more empathy for these people who even in your version

of this, you killed only by accident. But if I accidentally killed three people, I would be talking about that. I wouldn't be talking about how they were so good to me and why I wouldn't have done it. I wouldn't be talking at all. No, quite. It's just, there's just so many weird things about this. And also I just want to point this out because it fucking drives me mad. This is immediately after the deaths. She's getting the names wrong. She's saying Don is still in hospital. Ian, Heather and

Gail have died. Ian is the one who's in the coma. Don is dead. Again, I would think if I killed three people and put one person in a coma, you'd sure as fuck think I would know who was still alive. I find that quite shocking. So yeah, let's continue, shall we? Because it's just going to get interesting. Just pay attention to the questions asked and the responses given. I think that's key for this next bit. 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 Don is still in hospital and I pray, I pray that he pulls through because my children love him. And you must be pretty shaken up by 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. How are you kids? I just can't believe it. Just can't believe it. Can you tell us where the mushrooms came from? Were they picked from the property area? I was just asking

to leave me alone now 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 that they're gone and I hope that every fiber of my being that Don pulls through

that's what I have to say Where do the mushrooms come from? Don't step. Do they keep by you or do they come from there? Well, I don't think she'll be cast in any community theatre productions any time soon. Not even in prison. She can't look any of them in the eye. She's constantly like moving her gaze, which is what people do when they lie, by the way. And she can't, she can't look them

in the eye. And I feel like she's willing the tears to come. They're like, she's like, she's trying so desperately for the tears to come, but they won't come. And she's doing that like sobbing, which I'm just like, it sounds so unrealistic. It sounds like what children do. Yeah. It's like when you punch your sister in the face and you realize that you've actually really hurt her and they're like, Oh my God, please don't tell mom. And then she, not from personal experience or anything,

makes it way bigger than it has to be. It's that noise. Yep. It's like, yes, exactly. Yeah. Like it is really jarring to watch that. I think it's we've seen fake people crying. We've seen crocodile tears many a time on this show before. I would say she is one of the least successful at convincing anybody.

Yes, it is quite bad. I also I'm aware that this is reasonably rural Australia, right? That news crew. I think you just did a crime. Obviously, she did it, whatever, she's a bad person. But just sort of hanging outside her house, waiting for her to come home, not on, I don't think. It's not like the McCanns doing a press conference and appealing for information. They're just like, waiting for her. And I just think that's a bit weird. But slow news day possibly. I mean, this was the story. So they were the ones to get this. I mean, can we call it an

interview? I suppose because she does stand there. She stands there and she talks to them. She does like engage with them. And I think that this is one of those moments that we are going to see a lot over the course of this episode. And particularly next week's episode, when we get into the trial is how Erin Patterson, I believe at her core, thinks that she is more intelligent than everybody else and can trick and convince and manipulate everybody with her words. Because like the journalist there said to her, you know, the police have named you as a suspect in this. Does she not have a lawyer yet?

As we'll go on to find she's a very wealthy woman, is Erin Patterson. I believe she would have a lawyer at this point. And I can't believe any lawyer would have given her the green light to talk to the press. I, that's what I thought immediately. Because that is going to just be an absolute ginormous nail in your coffin. That interview did not help her one ounce. I think she thought it would. I think she thought she would. I think she thought she

probably came across incredibly convincing, but it is really, really awkward, cringe-worthy and jarring to watch. And particularly the line where they say, can you tell us about the lunch? And she just starts talking about other things. She doesn't want to talk about it. And then the bit where, oh, they say the police say you did it or something. You're a suspect. You're a suspect. And she says, well, I say I didn't do it. She doesn't say I didn't do it. And look, you know, we can, we can pick holes in innocent people who have given these sort of interviews and things that they have done that seem, seem odd, but

we have been gifted here with a woman who clearly fucking did it and a, and a perfect little microcosm of an interview that is just some of the very worst acting I've ever seen in the world of true crime. So yeah, let's move on. Before we get to the police investigation and the aftermath of the deaths, we're going to talk about the victims themselves. 70-year-old Don and Gail Patterson, Simon's parents, been married for 50 years. I had to triple check that because I was like is that right? Yeah. 50 years. I think when you get to 60 years in this country you get a

letter from the King. I think that's diamond 60. Yeah 50 fucking years. I literally will not live that long. There's no way I could get married tomorrow. I will not be married for that long. Accepting applications. Don and Gail had four children and Simon was the oldest one. And even though Simon and Erin had been separated, Don and Gail were really involved in their grandchildren's lives. They just seemed like the nicest, most lovely grandparents you could ever hope to have. They just seemed like the sweetest people. Retired school teacher Don was tutoring Simon and Erin's son in maths, and they'd often hang out out the weekends carrying out little science experiments in the garden. It's so cute. There's like this video footage that they played to the jury at trial of like

Don because he's really into science, like building a rocket with their son in the garden. It's literally like a few weeks before they die. And they're like setting it alight and like Gail's in the background. She's like, oh, it's lit, but it's not moving. And it's like, it's just this adorable little like home video of these grandparents who had such a close relationship with their grandkids. And again, it just, it, we're going to talk about motive next week. It just really boggles the mind of why someone would tear grandparents that loving and that involved away from grandkids who also clearly adored them. Gail spent her retirement years volunteering, teaching asylum seekers to speak English. 69-year-old Ian and 66-year-old Heather also

had four children and as a couple were very involved in the community. had four children and as a couple were very involved in the community. Ian was the pastor like I said and Heather helped out at a nearby school as a teaching assistant. Ian said that he'd only really considered Erin to be an acquaintance but he was happy to be invited over to her house for lunch nevertheless. Now let's take a look at the relationship between Simon and Erin themselves. The pair first met in the early 2000s when they both worked at the Monash Council. Erin actually has a degree in business and accounting and is actually a qualified air traffic controller. So look she's not a stupid

person. No she's not. She's not a stupid person you know you can't be an air traffic controller and be quite as stupid as she seems when she's giving that. It's really difficult to pass the exams very mathy. She's not a stupid person. You know, you can't be an air traffic controller and be quite as stupid as she seems when she's giving that video. It's really difficult to pass the exams, very mathy. She's a very intelligent woman. Which again, begs a lot of questions as to why this case kind of unfolded in the way it's depicted. Well, I guess... I think it's arrogance.

Yes, I think it's too much of a good thing. So at the time she met Simon, she wasn't actually working as an air traffic controller for Monash Council. She was working in animal management, which like seems odd that that's what she was doing, but that's what she was doing. And Simon was a civil engineer. They probably do have to manage a lot of animals in Australia. Otherwise they get the bullfrog like in the Simpsons. Quite, quite. I'm just like, you're a qualified air traffic controller. Why are you working in animal management? Don't know, but who knows. Controlling things?

She's a very controlling person. So yes, they met there and then they got married in June 2007. And I thought it was quite interesting, like we don't know a whole hell of a lot about Erin's family. Mainly a lot of the stuff we know is about Simon's side and Erin's relationship with Gail and Don, et cetera. But we don't really know that much about Erin's parents. Her dad doesn't seem to be in the picture at all really. And her mom dies, which we'll talk about in a second. But at their wedding in June 2007, both their parents are still alive and they don't come

to the wedding. They were apparently on a train in Russia. That's all we hear. But I'm like, okay. Okay, Lee Harvey Oswald, like, what? Yeah, you're just not going to come to your daughter's wedding? I don't know. Anyway, things between Erin and Simon looked really good at the start. They had a lot in common, they were really happy, and after the wedding, they bought a campervan and travelled all over Australia together. But soon Erin made it clear that she was ready for a family and a more settled life. So the pair set up home in Victoria, near Simon's

parents. And yeah, like I said, bit of a mystery on Erin's parents' side but what we do know is that a few years into the marriage Erin's mum actually died. And when she did, she left a sizeable inheritance to Erin of two million Australian dollars. And Erin was not stingy with that money. She actually lent hundreds of thousands of dollars to Simon's siblings so that they could all buy or build their own homes. And she didn't even charge interest on these loans. She simply stated that the loans be paid back in line with inflation. And despite the breakup, Erin still got on really well with Simon's parents.

She and his dad Don both shared a love of learning and bonded over science-y stuff. And as for Gail, she'd been there for Erin when she'd had her babies, with Erin even crediting her mother-in-law for showing her the importance of just enjoying being a mother rather than worrying about every little thing. Erin had remained a fixture in the Patterson family calendar of events, and for years things had been pretty good between her and Simon. They co-parented well, they went on family holidays together and they regularly text each other about politics. In fact, when Erin's

grandmother died, she left Erin yet more money which she used to buy some more properties, some of which she actually put in Simon's name. Erin said that this was because she was hopeful that one day they'd find a way to bring their family back together. And that's a quote. The challenges between Erin and Simon seem to have started in 2022, when Simon filed a tax return in which he stated that he and Erin were separated. And although they were, this pissed Erin off big time. Because they'd had an agreement.

And this revelation would have big tax implications for her. Simon said that it had just been a mistake, a misunderstanding with his accountant and that he would fix it. I am not on Erin Patterson's side. I would be furious if I'm lending your family hundreds of thousands of doll-y dues with no interest and you are making sure that I get fucked by the taxman, I would be incensed. Yeah. So Simon says, like you said, it was a complete mistake. I believe him.

I can fix it. But Erin tells him, don't fucking bother. She's like, don't bother. If that's how it's going to be, then fine. Bring it. I'm going after you for child support. Right. That's what, that's the situation we're in now.

And she did it. And it caused a lot of confusion because basically she claims child support. And then the child support agency get involved, right? Gay get involved and they contact Simon and they say, stop paying for everything. Stop giving Erin any money. Like you shouldn't be paying for school fees or medical fees for the kids individually, independently. From now on, you will make a monthly contribution of child support payments

to Erin and that will be all the money that is received, right? From that money, she will take to pay for everything. I don't fully understand like what was going on here, but the amount that they arrive at for Simon to pay Erin is very, very small. It basically works out at like $40 per child per month. And they're in private schools. So I don't fully get that. No, I just don't think I know enough about how it works.

I don't fully get that. I don't fully get that. I just don't think I know enough about how it works. I don't get it. And I wonder if it's because Erin on paper was so much more wealthy than Simon. Is that why the amount was so small? I don't know. But Erin basically was not happy at all about the amount of money that Simon was being told to pay her. And she basically pulled the kids out of the private school

that they were in without even telling Simon. Because she's contacting him saying, you need to pay for and she basically pulled the kids out of the private school that they were in without even telling Simon because she's contacting him saying you need to pay for the school fees and he's saying they've told me not to pay for them and maybe it was just teething problems, maybe Simon really is that stingy, I don't know but those were the facts of what was going on. Erin also tried to enlist the help of Gail and Don, asking them to mediate between her and Simon to resolve the child support issues. But Simon's parents made it clear, they did not want to get in the middle of anything and I wouldn't either. I honestly think that is the best course of action. Parents, family, even friends, people

getting involved in other people's relationships, especially when it comes to money. No one's going to thank you at the end of that. I think they absolutely made the right decision. I totally agree. And then there was Gail's 70th birthday party in October 2022. Erin initially wasn't invited and she was raging about it. Simon explained that it had just been a communication issue and that his parents loved her and of course they wanted her there.

But Erin felt like she was being pushed out of her own family and it hurt. And look, I am not gonna sit here and say that a legal, financial, emotional battle with your ex is not going to be incredibly painful and difficult. Like I understand that that would be true. I'm not going to do a murder about it though, quite. But school fees, child support, who's invited to what party, it's all honestly a bit fucking boring. But we have to talk about it because this is really the only animosity that seemed to exist between Erin and her ex, not ex-husband but ex-partner Simon, and his parents.

This is the only animosity that anyone can find that existed between them. At least visibly. And we'll go on to talk about possible motives later in this episode, particularly in next week's episode. But I have a feeling that for someone like Erin, this was enough. Erin was upset that the Patisons, the only family that she really had, had pushed her aside. She'd given the siblings all this money and now her in-laws wouldn't talk sense into their son for her and she was getting sidelined from

parties. The lack of gratitude that she no doubt felt was owed to her boiled her blood. So to public health investigators the whole mushroom situation was getting increasingly more hot. No one else in the suburbs of Glenwaverley, Mount Waverley, Clayton, Oakley, or anywhere else in the whole of Australia for that matter had got sick from death cap poisoning. No one else. So it seemed like a massive stroke of bad luck that Erin Patterson had picked up the only bag that had been out there on some nefarious Asian supermarket shelf. But if that was the case, then it also seemed like a massive stroke of luck that she was

also, alongside her two kids, the only people to not get sick from eating this lunch that had killed three people and put a man in a coma for two months. And by this point the police had tested the leftovers from Erin's bin and found death cap toxins in the mushroom paste and in the meat. Because that mushroom fucking toxin is going to seep into the meat that the duck cell is on top of, right? So their suspicions of Erin were growing because her claim was that the kids weren't sick because she scraped the mushrooms off but it's in the meat anyway so how are they not sick? And so, on the 3rd of August 2023, the homicide team took over. And they did stress at the

time that they were only taking over to examine the case as a complex death inquiry as investigators on behalf of the coroner rather than under suspicion of outright murder. But let's be honest, three people were dead and one was on death's door so there was always going to be some sort of investigation. On the 5th of August the police carried out a search of Erin's home and she showed them the recipe book that she had used for the beef wellington. And she might be wondering, who makes individual beef wellingtons? And didn't Erin say in her text messages to Simon that she'd specifically bought very expensive rib-eye steaks. Yes. Erin would tell the police that she had been unable to find a large cut of beef tenderloin

as the recipe had called for, so she decided to make her Wellingtons with five pieces of rib-eye steak instead. Beef tenderloin isn't really that hard to come by. And it really seemed like the individual portions may have served a much more sinister purpose. Yeah, because if you're trying to poison people, right? And I am. Yes. Just this is this welcome to our new cooking segment if you're trying to poison somebody, right? And you make a whole Beef Wellington, as is traditional. You have no control over how much duck cell falls into every bit. Much

like if you maybe like to make yourself a little space brownie. The inherent problem is always you don't know how much is going to end up in every fucking slice. So one person having a great time, another person being sick, another person having a fucking boring old evening. You just don't know. Or going to lie down like your mum. Right. This one fucking killer, Jesus Christ. So yeah, I think that was Erin's thinking. If I make a whole Wellington, I have no control over how much duck cellar ends up in each bit and therefore what dosage of the death cap mushrooms everybody gets. Whereas if I make individual portions, I know exactly how much duck cellars in each portion. That is what I believe the reasoning. Also probably

because it's a lot fucking easier. Because essentially it's just a piece of steak with some duck cellar wrapped in pastry. That's why I said they're more like pasties rather than like a proper beef Wellington, which is obviously incredibly difficult to make. Although I have never made one. But I do believe you said it would be your dinner party dish once upon a time. Well I... Depends how much you like the people. Well like if I could do it well then yes it would be because it's like to show off right like yeah however I really disagree with serving anybody steak in a dinner party setting because everybody

likes it done so differently. And I have very strong opinions on how it should be done. And if anyone crosses that, you will murder them. Wanted a well done steak in my house, I would have to get them to leave. I just think it's sinful. Best just left out of the equation then I think. That is my point. Anything over a medium rare, I'm judging you. I am. I don't eat beef so I find that hard to wrap my head around but I am also a food snob so

I can get on board with the feelings. Also I worked at Flatiron for two years. I know about Meaf. Meat. Beef. Meaf. Meaf. Said both. But it's very hot in here. It is incredibly hot. I am a Ventura inside the rhinos butt. That is how I feel. Warm. Oh my god. Okay so yes. She's making these pasties. She's filling them with duck's help. Let's talk about what the police found on a tablet. So electronic tablet that they found in Erin's house. Okay. They found on there several pictures of a set of kitchen scales

that looked very much like the ones that Erin owned. And in these pictures, it looked like some dried mushrooms were being weighed on them. In a kitchen that looked a lot like Erin's kitchen, right? Erin's scales were later tested and bingo found to have traces of death cap toxins on. Again remember I just want to be fair, I want to be clear, this doesn't prove that Erin knew what she was using were dried death caps. All it proves is, dried death caps, or death caps full stop, were in her kitchen. And we already know that. We know that they were in the food because by this point the hospital has already tested the victims. And

while no death cap toxins were found in Gail and Heather's body, they were found in Ian and Don's. And they just think it's because people metabolize toxins differently. And also Gail and Heather weren't tested until like a few days later. And it can leave your body quite quickly. So they already know death cap toxins is what killed them. Because at this point, remember, she's still claiming that she got them from an Asian supermarket. So she can just be an innocent idiot who is using these mushrooms.

The question for me is, and maybe Hannah, you can help us out with this. Why the fuck would one need to weigh out mushrooms for a duck cell? Duck cells, as far as I know, is just a mushroom paté situation. You hate following instructions though. I do hate following instructions. If I am, I can see, I can conceive of a world in which I would weigh the mushrooms. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Well, I have written this next bit as if I can't conceive of that one. That's why I'm here. Because I was just like, why on earth would you need to be so specific

about the mushroominess of this paste? I would just be like, you make the paste, you taste the paste, oh, it needs a bit more mushroom, needs a bit more salt. That's how you cook. Lots of people don't. Okay. Well, that's what I thought. And Erin said, Erin's claim was similarly to what Hannah, you are saying, she said that she changed the recipe, right? Because the recipe calls for one log. She's saying I had to make six individual portions. When I made six individual portions, I needed more pastry, I needed more mushroom because they're all sitting a separate little parcels now. So therefore I wanted to make sure

the balance of the duck cell was right, which is why I was weighing up these dried mushrooms in order to make sure the balance remained. Okay, sure, fine. My question then would be, why is she using these old dried up mushrooms from her pantry? The ones that she allegedly, according to her, had rejected for a carbonara months before because they smell too strong.

Why would you now use them in this recipe just because you needed extra mushrooms? Especially based on what you're about to tell us next, Hannah. And I'm going to. When the police got access to Erin's bank statements, the story of her desperately needing some extra mushrooms made even less sense. Her bank statement showed that Erin had bought 1.2 kilos of mushrooms from a local supermarket on the 23rd of July, just a few days before the lunch. So how did she not have enough mushrooms to make a duck sell?

Even if it was for six individual portions, a kilo of mushrooms is a lot of mushrooms. Yeah because that's her story. Her story is well I just didn't have enough mushrooms, I needed more mushrooms now I'm making individual portions so I had to delve into my pantry and dig out these old dried up mushrooms that I'd bought months before from an Asian supermarket and then I weighed them on some scales and then I put them in the dark cell. But you bought 1.2 kilos literally like two three days before? Well according to Erin she had eaten 1.2 kilos literally like two three days before? Well according to Erin she had eaten 1.2 kilos of mushrooms herself. I like a mushroom. In two days. So again

look I know we're nitpicking I know it might seem like little small things that we're picking up on but this is a story that Erin tells right so we have to follow up on it. So coming back to the tablet that police found on there they also found pictures of a dehydrator like a vegetable dehydrator, a food dehydrator with mushrooms being dried. When asked, this just gets better and better and worse and worse for Erin because the police asked her, have you ever owned a dehydrator? I don't want this woman air traffic controlling, I'm just going to put that out into the ether. Good, good, because that should never be happening.

When asked this Erin said she'd never owned a dehydrator. The police kept the pictures that they had found on her tablet to themselves but they asked Erin about a manual for a food dehydrator that they had found in the house. And Erin told them she just liked collecting manuals. Oh, fuck off. I swear to God. I swear to God. That's like if you were writing a character of someone who is painfully dull, that's like a thing that you would give them as like a quirk. I always think that's what she's trying to do.

Is paint herself as this ordinary, just boring mother of two. I think it worked. That's why everyone's so fucking obsessed with it because she's so boring. Yeah, she really is. So many people are like, she's like, look at her. She couldn't have done this. And I'm like, well, just because she's fucking boring? Do you think she couldn't have murdered all these people? She fucking did.

And I can say that now because she's an evicted. Anyway, police had another little look at Erin's bank statements and they spotted that four days after the death lunch, Erin had paid for a visit to the tip. I have to take my ID to go to the tip. Do you know that? Fucking outrageous. Probably because of things like this. Well, sure. And this tip also that she chose to go to had fucking CCTV. So yeah. Well, if anywhere should have CCTV, it's the dump. Anyway, said CCTV footage from said tip showed Erin dumping something, which turned out to be a food dehydrator, which investigators actually managed to retrieve on the 4th of August and then they tested it. And say it with me, it was found to contain traces of death cat mushrooms.

Again, I will play devil's advocate for a second and say it still doesn't prove that Erin knew what they were. You could say that she still put these mushrooms in her food dehydrator without knowing what they were and then dumps the dehydrator. A dehydrator that she claims she's never owned. But here's another question. Why would the death cap mushrooms have been in the dehydrator if Erin had bought them months before as dried mushrooms? Well, according to Erin, once she finally admitted that she did indeed own and dump a food dehydrator, she actually has a series of interesting explanations for all of that, but we're going to have to save that, just like Erin did for the trial. Yeah.

So sticking with our timeline, that day after the search, Erin was taken in for questioning by Constable Steve Eppingstall and Detective Senior Constable David Martin Alcate. Police said that they were trying to understand how everyone else had become so ill after the lunch, but Erin said she had been unwell and the kids were only fine because she'd scraped off all the mushroom paste before she'd given them the meal. Even though, as we told you, when the meat was tested from the bin in Erin's house, it was found to be contaminated with the same death cap toxins. Again, Erin would have a different answer for this question at trial, but that is for

next week. So, you know, save it. She was also asked again about the dehydrator in this interview, because remember by this point the police have found it when they're talking to her, but they don't tell her that. And so she's asked about it again and she once again denies owning a dehydrator because she doesn't know that they have paid a visit to the tip. When she's shown the pictures of the dehydrator from her tablet, Erin said that perhaps she'd owned one a long time ago.

So during this interview Erin also clearly stated when questioned that she had never foraged for mushrooms. So this time no one's saying have you been mushrooming? They ask her if she's been foraging and she says no. Another thing that detectives queried was the reason for the lunch in the first place. Because yeah Erin says it was perfectly ordinary for them all to get together for lunch like that. Simon was like, no, it wasn't. And like we told you, Ian and Heather, who are Simon's aunt and uncle, didn't really know Erin that well. So they were invited. Why were they invited? Don and Gail, okay, maybe, but this group lunch, Simon is like, that was weird.

And it was strange that she was doing it. But she insists that it was perfectly normal. Police had found screenshots on Erin's devices of the symptoms of ovarian cancer and Don had told his son Simon, before he died, that Erin had told them all that she'd been diagnosed with cancer. Once Ian was out of his coma, he confirmed this as well. The police questioned Erin if she'd lied about having cancer and was that why everybody was at lunch that day? Erin said absolutely not. She didn't have cancer and she'd never told anyone that she did. But texts between Gail and Erin tell a very different story. For example, there was a note in Gail's diary for the 26th of June that said,

Erin St Vincent's arm lump. On the 28th of June at 7.30pm, Gail texted Erin asking how she'd got on at her appointment. And the next day Erin replied saying, it went okay, had a needle biopsy taken, have an MRI next week, then we'll know more. To which Gail said, praying for you, that's a lot to deal with, hugs and kisses. And then the next week Gail texts again saying how did you get on with the medical test? To which Erin replied, a lot to digest, might talk to you more about it when I see you both. And the next entry in Gail's

diary was lunch at Erin's with Heather and Ian. Needle biopsy, MRI, lump. Okay she never says the word cancer in those text messages but it's because she says it at the lunch. And I believe that she said it at the lunch because Don and Ian both say that she did. So Erin, I think it's very clear was definitely telling Gail that she had some pretty major health concerns. And yet the police could find absolutely no record of any of these appointments. They could find no record of Erin having a needle biopsy or her having an MRI or any of the various appointments that she has clearly told Gail in these text messages that she had. So at first Erin tried to explain this

away by saying that she had concerns around cancer, that there was a lot of cancer in her family and that she had had a range of appointments over the years for various different symptoms and that she had been particularly worried of appointments over the years for various different symptoms, and that she'd been particularly worried about getting ovarian cancer. And that's why she had been googling her symptoms. And that's why she had been talking to Gail about various doctor's appointments that she'd had over the years. Now this explanation of course completely sidesteps the fact that she had told Gail

about specific procedures that she claimed to be having on that she had told Gail about specific procedures that she claimed to be having on specific dates, because Gail's got it in her diary, specific dates when she's having these procedures done. None of which were true. And as you guessed it, Erin's story about all of this, as well as many other things, would change dramatically when she got to trial. So for now, once again, let's set that aside and we will come back to it next week. So with suspicions mounting, on the 5th of August the police searched Erin's home. And

that day they seized a phone, a tablet and a computer. Later, when the police checked the phone, they discovered that it had been factory resets four times, including three times after the deadly lunch. And it gets better because the timestamp for one of those factory resets was at 3.30pm on the 5th of August when the police were at Erin's house, searching said house. Basically, Erin had been allowed to go off into a room alone to call her lawyer while the police were there. And during that little breakaway, she had reset her phone. But hadn't bothered to delete the photographs on her tablet.

And another reset prior to this one had been done three days before on the 2nd of August. But the third and final reset had been done remotely using an app after the phone had been taken into police custody on the 6th of August. So she does the reset while the police are on the 5th, they take it away and she factory resets it again while it's in their custody. Now we will come back to the whole phones situation next week and note I said phones plural. I heard you. It's phones and sims. Because things get a lot more confusing and a hell of a lot more suspicious.

But the thing about Erin that you all have to understand is that she always has an answer for everything. Even if it makes no fucking sense at all. So let's have a little look at what the police found on the computer they seized from Erin's house. When it was analyzed, investigators discovered a number of things that stood out including searches for whether death cap mushrooms grew in Gippsland which is the area that extends from Melbourne's eastern suburbs to New

South Wales. During these searches an article was accessed titled Death cap mushroom from Melbourne, thickick Australia. And that article included information about a sighting made by an iNaturalist user on the 18th of May 2022. So after the Deathcap article had been read, the website cited in that article had been searched for using Bing. I hate that. Using Bing on a Chrome browser.

I just thought that was just too good. She's hilarious. She's hilarious. She's on Google Chrome and she searches for Bing to then use Bing to search for this website. It's hilarious. Prison! She should get life just for that. Anyway, the website iNaturalist is like a public science forum kind of and on the page that had been visited on that computer that was taken from Erin's house there was quite a lot of discussion about mushrooms, death caps in particular. After that the police could also see from May 2022 onwards, the iNaturalist website had been visited multiple times using Erin's computer. And on that forum, there was an entry by a woman named Christine McKenzie.

Christine had written on iNaturalist that as a retired poison specialist, she was a bit worried about something she had found. On the 18th of April 2023, Christine posted online naturalists saying that she had been out for a walk with her husband and her grandson in Locke, which is about 28km from Leongatha. Christine said that on this walk she had spotted some death cap mushrooms growing under an oak tree. And look, like I said, Christine is a retired poison specialist and she knew exactly how dangerous these mushrooms were. So she took some photos of these mushrooms and then she collected all the ones that she could find in a dog poo bag and threw them away.

Very responsible, very safe, top work Christine. Now in her post about this on iNaturalist, Christine even geo-tagged the location in Locke where she had found these mushrooms. And the reason for doing this was so that other users, other people could keep an eye out for any sort of regrowth in that area and also destroy any of these mushrooms if they happen to come across them. Right? So it's all very like, with good reason that Christine is doing this. And then in May, 2023, another user, someone who calls themselves Funky Tom, who is actually Dr. Tom May, who's a principal fungi research scientist at the Royal Botanical Gardens in Melbourne, also posted about death caps on the

iNaturalist website. Dr. Tom said that he had spotted some near Outrim, less than 20 kilometres from Lee and Gartha. Certainly looked quite a lot like Erin Paterson was fascinated by these deadly mushrooms, and was possibly trying quite hard to get her hands on some. Because death caps can't be cultivated, they only grow in the wild. And they only do that during very specific months of the year. We'll come back to that. And crucially, we will also tell you about the cell tower phone data next week

when we get into the trial. And yeah, I think this combination of the iNaturalist forum post plus the cell phone data was kind of like a real smoking gun for me. I appreciate there are some issues with it and we'll talk about it next week when we get to the trial. And I do also want to say just to be fair and clear that they couldn't prove that Erin had looked at or seen Dr. Tom May or Christine McKenzie's posts. They couldn't prove, because she didn't interact with them. They couldn't prove that she had seen them.

But she had been on that website where those posts were made, like I said. So let's wrap this episode up with the arrest. After finding all of this, the police felt pretty certain that Erin had indeed foraged for wild mushrooms and then lied about this mythical Asian supermarket and basically sent them on a bit of a wild goose chase. Her story about the suburb in which she had bought them from kept changing, the description of the bag of the mushrooms wasn't consistent with anything the public health had found. It just didn't seem to add up and also add in the fact that nobody else got sick and all the other samples

that they had tested of mushrooms from all of these different shops, they hadn't found any other death caps. It just seemed highly unlikely that somebody was doing this nefariously. They also discovered, and this is quite interesting but sort of leads nowhere, that in 2022 Simon Patterson had actually suffered from a perplexing stomach illness, So the year before the deadly lunch in 2023. In May 2022, Simon had actually been so sick that he had been hospitalized and they never discovered what had been making him sick. And Aaron had reluctantly agreed to nurse him back to health for three weeks after he was released from hospital.

And so on the 2nd of November 2023, three months after that deadly lunch, Erin was arrested and charged with three counts of murder and five counts of attempted murder. And that is obviously one count of attempted murder against Ian Wilkinson and four against Simon Patterson. So one from the lunch because remember she wanted him to be there. She'd cooked him a meal. And three from 2022. So join us next week where we will be picking up with the second and final part of our series into the case of Erin Patterson. And next week we'll be getting into the psychology of a poisoner. We'll be talking about motivations that Erin may have had. And also and also of course all the drama of that very hotly anticipated trial.

Is Funky Tom there? Yeah. Okay great. He is great. He is fantastic. So yeah, we'll talk about all that next week. So yes, again, if you have listened to this and you want to watch the video version, you could do both.

Just go watch the YouTube video of this as well. And be sure to go and listen to Flesh and Code, which is out now wherever you listen to your podcasts. We'll see you next week. Or else. Yeah, or we'll feed you a mushroom pasty. See you then. Bye! What if your life was turned upside down by a sudden accident, leaving you to face the consequences and pick up the pieces? Fire Escape brings you the extraordinary true story of Amika Moda, a young mother whose world was shattered in an instant. Amika's haunting journey from tragic crash to a prison firefighter is one of hope and

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