Australia - 3 dead after eating wild mushrooms, Leongatha, Victoria, Aug 2023 #11 *Arrest*

[MrJ]

1m ago
Questions cover Erin's financial situation

By Joseph Dunstan

Colin Mandy begins asking Erin Patterson about her grandmother, who passed away in 2006.

The court hears Erin was one of several beneficiaries in her grandmother's will, and a number of properties were involved.

The first distribution of funds was in 2007 and the last in 2015, Erin says. She says that helped the family.

"The travel, particularly international, was a big part of that, but it did allow us to buy a home when we settled in Western Australia, without a mortgage," she says.

She also helped Simon Patterson's siblings buy homes, offering loans of about $400,000 each to two couples.

The repayments from Simon's siblings were of amounts and timing of their choosing and the repayments solely covered inflation, not interest, Erin says.

 

[drsleuth]

2m ago01.42 BST
The jury has entered the court room in Morwell

Erin Patterson is continuing to give evidence in her triple murder trial.

Erin Patterson trial day 25 – as it happened

This blog is now closed

www.theguardian.com

 

[MrJ]

Just now
Erin owned second-hand book store

By Joseph Dunstan

The court hears in about 2011, Erin started up a second-hand book store in WA.

"I spent months travelling around south-west and Western Australia collecting books to sell there," she says.

"I went to a lot of … book fairs and libraries selling their old stock and estates selling their books and I did that for quite a while.

"I painted the inside [of the shop], I bought about 30 or 35 bookshelves from Ikea, put them together and I got things like the internet and phone [set up]."

 

[MsMarple]

That is not really a tough thing to do .... fill all the seats in that tiny courtroom.

Apparently people were showing up as early as 6 am in hopes of getting a seat. I think everyone is waiting to hear about the lunch in the accused’s own words.

 

[drsleuth]

2 minutes ago

Erin's evidence resumes
Erin has entered the witness box.
She rose to her feet as the 14 jurors entered the packed courtroom.
Wearing a navy shirt with white dots, her long hair is again draped over her shoulders.
She took a sip of water before her defence barrister Colin Mandy SC asked his first question of the day.
Erin has brought her glasses into the witness box, but placed them to the side.
Mr Mandy begins by asking his client about her financial circumstances, including an inheritance.
She agrees her grandmother passed away in 2006 and Erin was one of a large number of people who inherited her estate, which was distributed between 2007 and 2015.
“There were a number of commercial properties that needed to be sold in that time,” she said.
Erin said the money allowed her to travel and buy a home in Western Australia without a mortgage.
She was also able to help three of estranged husband Simon’s siblings and their partners to buy their own homes, lending them about $400,000 each.
She said the loans were interest-free but kept up with inflation.

https://www.heraldsun.com.au/truecrimeaustralia/the-mushroom-cook/erin-patterson-trial-live-mushroom-cook-returns-to-the-witness-box/live-coverage/d38ddeff9157a7fe0ede32b695044a4f

 

[SouthAussie]

Just now
Erin owned second-hand book store

By Joseph Dunstan

The court hears in about 2011, Erin started up a second-hand book store in WA.

"I spent months travelling around south-west and Western Australia collecting books to sell there," she says.

"I went to a lot of … book fairs and libraries selling their old stock and estates selling their books and I did that for quite a while.

"I painted the inside [of the shop], I bought about 30 or 35 bookshelves from Ikea, put them together and I got things like the internet and phone [set up]."

Relevance? Did she buy mushroom foraging books?

What's the bet that this long rambling history of her marriage goes on and on, and then the actual poisonings are mentioned as a blip at the end. "Ms Patterson did you intentionally poison your in laws?" "No".

imo

 

[MrJ]

Key Event
Just now
Couple moved back to Victoria 12 years ago

By Joseph Dunstan

The court hears Erin and Simon packed up in about 2013 and moved back to Victoria from WA.

"It was the culmination of a lot of factors. [Our son] was a very extroverted child and he seemed to struggle with the lack of siblings and contact with cousins and living in the middle of nowhere, no friends to play with," she says.

She says on trips back to Victoria from WA, it was clear her son really enjoyed time with his cousins.

Erin says she was also pregnant with her daughter, and wanted to be near Don and Gail for that next chapter of the family's life.

When they settled arrived back in Victoria, they moved in with Don and Gail for a few weeks.

"It was cramped in that all three of us were in the one room ... but it didn't matter because Don and Gail were so welcoming to us and ... I think they loved having all three of us there," Erin says.

"It was a really good experience."

 

[mamamama9873]

Erin isn't exactly obese

Colin Mandy in his cross examination of the police inspector confirmed that she weighed 111kg upon checking into the hospital on the Monday after the lunch.

I don’t know how tall Erin is but she’d basically have to be over 2m to not be considered obese at that weight.

She would 100% be considered obese in medical terms and very likely eligible for gastric bypass surgery.

 

[drsleuth]

3m ago10.46 AEST
Patterson’s defence lawyer, Colin Mandy SC, asks Patterson about her inheritances.

She confirms her grandmother died in 2006 and she was one of a large number of beneficiaries.

First distribution of the estate was about February 2007 and the last was towards the end of 2015, Patterson says.

Mandy asks what the money allowed her to do.

“It did allow us to buy a home. When we settled in Western Australia without a mortgage,” she says.

Patterson said the couple helped her estranged husband Simon’s siblings and their partners purchase their homes with loans of around $400,000.

She says the amount and timing of paying the money back was up to them. The loan was subject to inflation but not interest, Patterson says.

 

[MrJ]

her being syrupy about Don and Gail gives me such an ick.

 

[MrJ]

BBM:
Key Event
Just now
Erin and Simon Patterson separated multiple times

By Joseph Dunstan

At the end of 2015, Mr Mandy says the couple went through a "formal separation", but reconciled at least twice.

Erin says they tried to figure out a good arrangement for the children.

"You know, they had different needs," she says, adding the children were one and six years old at this time.

She says the couple's assets were divided up without lawyers.

"We just wrote down what we had, you know property, cash, what was owed to us, and then … divided it down the middle, is the best way to describe it," Erin says.

 

[drsleuth]

9 minutes ago - 10:43 AMMax Corstorphan

Patterson gives evidence on inheritance she recieved​

Ms Patterson has said that around February 2007, she received the first part of an inheritance from a family estate.

“It did allow us to buy a home,” Ms Patterson said, adding it was purchased “without a mortgage”.

Ms Patterson said the funds also were shared with Simon Patterson’s siblings, allowing them to pay off parts of their homes.

Ms Patterson claimed the family were to repay the funds, “at a time of their choosing”.

She explained most family members paid the money back over time, but added she was “unaware” of the status of one of the family loans.

7 minutes ago - 10:45 AMMax Corstorphan

Patterson used inheritance to start ‘second hand book shop’.​

Ms Patterson explained she used some of the funds from an inheritance she received to start a business, a second-hand book shop.

She said she operated this for around “a year”.

Ms Patterson said that the funds allowed her to spend time at book fairs, collecting books for her store’s collection.
3 minutes ago - 10:49 AMMax Corstorphan

Why Pattersons moved back to Victoria​

Ms Patterson explained that the family decided to move back to Victoria so that her children could be close to “nana and papa”, referring to Don and Gail Patterson.

She told the court that the family stayed with Don and Gail before she moved to a rental property.

It was then that Mrs Patterson had her second child.

Accused mushroom killer testifies about fatal lunch

RECAP: Erin Patterson has returned to the witness box to discuss the fatal lunch that left three people dead.

thenightly.com.au

 

[drsleuth]

now10.53 AEST
Erin Patterson started up a second-hand bookstore in Western Australia

Opened in 2011, she says this involved travelling around the state and collecting books.

Erin says her and her sister were the beneficiaries of their mother’s estate after she died in 2019.

This allowed her to buy a home in Mount Waverley and Leongatha, she says.

Mandy turns to Erin and her estranged husband Simon Patterson’s decision to move back to Victoria from Western Australia in 2013.

Erin says the couple chose to come back to Victoria to allow her son to be close to his cousins and his grandparents, Don and Gail Patterson.

She says the family stayed with Don and Gail for a “good six weeks” when they first returned.

It was cramped in that all three of us were in the one room but it didn’t matter because Don and Gail were so welcoming to us and just liked having [our son] there... It was a really good experience.

Patterson and Simon’s daughter was born in 2014.

Erin Patterson trial day 25 – as it happened

This blog is now closed

www.theguardian.com

 

[TootsieFootsie]

If EP lost 14 stone or a couple of hundred pounds there'd be nothing left of her.
She's really not that huge.

 

[MrJ]

Key Event
1m ago
Separation was 'difficult', Erin testifies

By Joseph Dunstan

Erin says in the "immediate aftermath" of the separation, "it was difficult, as it had been at other separations".

"But that only lasted a handful of weeks. We went back to just being really good friends," she says.

She says she "constantly" reflected on the reasons for the separation.

"I didn't want to be separated, but I felt there was no choice," Erin says.

"Our primary problem was, if we had a disagreement or any kind of conflict, we didn't seem to be able to talk about it in a way where either or us felt heard or understood. We just felt hurt, and we didn't really know how to do that well."

 

[MsMarple]

her being syrupy about Don and Gail gives me such an ick.

Yeah, like I believe three weeks stuck in one bedroom in your in-laws home was a barrel of fun.

 

[MrJ]

Key Event
Just now
Erin says she still attended family events

By Joseph Dunstan

Erin says the couple "really liked each other still", but living together "didn't work".

But she says the care of the children was important to both of them, and they worked to juggle that around Simon's working hours.

But she says she still attended Patterson family events and her, Simon and the kids still holidayed as a family.

"We went to Tasmania a couple of times, we went to Darwin, caught the train there into Adelaide, we went to Queensland, we went to New Zealand, we went to South Africa, and we went to my mum's house in Eden ... NSW," she says.

Erin says her relationship with Don and Gail "never changed" over that time.

"I was just their daughter-in-law ... they just continued to love me," she says, her voice breaking up.

 

[SouthAussie]

Colin Mandy in his cross examination of the police inspector confirmed that she weighed 111kg upon checking into the hospital on the Monday after the lunch.

I don’t know how tall Erin is but she’d basically have to be over 2m to not be considered obese at that weight.

She would 100% be considered obese in medical terms and very likely eligible for gastric bypass surgery.

For our US members, 111 kg = 244.7 lbs

imo

 

[HoneyBunOne]

Agree. Its not that uncommon. I have several friends and family members who've had traumatic births. One thing they have in common is seeking a different form of prenatal care for future babies. For a couple it changed how they perceive relationships with medical professionals, but at no time did any of them check out of hospital against medical advice, and none went on to kill any relatives, accidentally or otherwise. None lost their job or stopped working (other than the usual mat leave, of course), or became estranged from relatives. I don't see it as a relevant excuse for anything, really. 'Erin can't cope with the things life throws at many people' doesn't mean anything with regard to the poisonings, imo.


Erin would definitely be medically obese. People are often surprised by how 'small' obese medically speaking actually is. I know a couple of people who've had weight loss surgery at her size.


Yeah I agree. Nothing she's said is that unusual. By the time you get to 50ish, most people have gone through stuff. Nothing she's said so far would make me think 'oohhhhh so this is why she accidentally poisoned a bunch of people, understandable'. For me its more like, so you're an adult person who's had adult stuff happen. Okay, and? But that's just me, maybe the jury is more sympathetic. I'm super curious where they're going with this tbh.


I think they probably told her not to. But, just as she thought she knew better than medical professionals on more than one occasion, she's doing it anyway because Erin knows best and Erin controls the narrative. And ultimately just like her plea, it is all her choice, not theirs. JMO.


I hope they keep manslaughter on the table. Especially involuntary manslaughter: "Involuntary manslaughter is an unlawful killing without intent.... For a court to find a person guilty of involuntary manslaughter, the prosecution must prove that the death was the result of an illegal act, omission or an act of neglect, or a failure to take reasonable care." IMO that would be pretty trivial to prove compared to murder, where the intent can be a lot more nebulous to prove beyond reasonable doubt.

First bold wording is by me.
I agree. By 50, people have generally accumulated some baggage, through their own doing or otherwise. Deaths, marriage break ups, work drama or unemployment, health issues, family stuff. Nothing Erin has said is startling, in fact it could be considered relatively mild compared to what can happen in childhood and adult life. I'm not sure the "poor Erin" narrative is going to work for her, especially after the prosecution are done with their questioning.

One only has to look at her to say she is obese. Nothing says "small" or "just a little obese". Erin knew she needed to lose a couple hundred pounds (14 plus stones).

I'm not sure about your conversion there. 200 pounds is 90 odd kilograms - a whole person, and not a small one at that. Yes, she is obese, yes, she can stand to lose a fair amount of weight, but 200 pounds/90 kilograms? No, not in my opinion. Her choice of outfits are not exactly slimming or becoming, but she's just not as obese as you say she is. MOO

***EDIT***
I just noticed that mamamama9873 posted that Erin was 111kg around the time of the meal. Whilst there's a good chance she's put on weight since then, being able to lose 90kg is just not possible.

 

[MrJ]

Key Event
Just now
Heather Wilkinson always 'made a point' of talking to Erin

By Joseph Dunstan

Mr Mandy asks Erin about her relationship with Heather Wilkinson and Ian Wilkinson and her attendance at the Korumburra Baptist Church where Mr Wilkinson was pastor.

Erin says she was attending church during that time and always chatted to Ian if she could.

"Heather would always make a point of coming to talk to me," she says.

"I saw them sometimes at Christmas gatherings, you know, that side of the family. I probably didn't get to chat to Ian so much, but Heather would always go out of her way to sit with me and make sure that I had company."

As she finishes talking about Heather making time to make her feel welcome, Erin's voice trembles a little.