Woman accused of triple murder says foraging mushrooms may have been added to the meal
Erin Patterson, accused of murdering three guests, with a meal with a death hat mushroom, told her trial Wednesday that she might have accidentally added foraging mushrooms to lunch because the taste of her duxelles was “a bit bland”.
In Wednesday’s third day of evidence, Patterson was in the July 2023 incident when she was accused of deliberately cooking the deadly death hat mushrooms (including her parents) from a beef cooked for four guests in a house in the small town of Leongatha, a small Australian town in the countryside of Leongatha.
Patterson denied three counts of murder because of her in-laws, Don Patterson and Gail Patterson, as well as Gail’s sister, Heather Wilkinson. She also denied trying to kill the fourth lunch guest, Heather’s husband, Ian Wilkinson, her local pastor.
A few days before bringing Patterson back to lunch, defense attorney Colin Mandy SC asked her where to buy ingredients. Patterson said all ingredients were from Australian supermarket Woolworths.
Patterson said she found the recipe in a recipe and then her “some deviations”. For example, she said she couldn’t find the beef tenderloin log, so she bought two packs of individual steaks. She said the recipe calls for mustard, she hasn’t used mustard, nor has she used Prosciutto because Don “don doesn’t eat pork.”
On Saturday morning of lunch, she said she fried garlic and scallions and chopped store-bought mushrooms in a food processor. She said she cooked the sautéed mixture (called Duxelles) for 45 minutes, so it was dry and didn’t soak the pastry.
Patterson told the court she tasted the mixture because it was “a bit bland” and she added dry mushrooms that were previously stored in plastic containers in the pantry.
Mandy asked what she said in the plastic container in the storage room: “I believe it’s just the mushroom I bought in Melbourne,” Patterson said. “Now, what do you think might be in this tub?” Mandy asked.
“Now, I think there are people there foraging, too,” she said.
Media stands outside the Latrobe Valley District Court in Mowell, Australia on April 29, 2025. -James Rose/AAP/Reuters
After a meal
Patterson told the court that Ian and Heather Wilkinson had all the meals. Don finished what Gale hadn’t eaten before. She said Patterson only ate about a quarter or a third of the beef Wellington because she talked a lot and ate slowly.
After lunch, they cleaned up and sat down to eat the orange cake that Gail brought.
“I have a cake, then a cake, and then another cake,” Patterson said. “How many cakes do you have?” Mandy asked. “All of this,” Patterson replied. That’s about two-thirds of the original cake, she said.
“I felt full, so I went to the bathroom and brought it back again,” she said. Patterson had previously told the court that she had fought bulimia for most of her life and was self-conscious about her weight.
Patterson said she felt sick after lunch and later that night, she took medication for diarrhea. The next day, due to the same symptoms, she skipped Sunday Mass and still suffered from diarrhea later that day.
She said that night, she removed pastries and mushrooms from the remaining beef Wellington and placed the meat in the microwave for the kids to have supper.
The next day, Monday, she thought she might need liquids, so she went to the hospital and the doctor told her that she might have been exposed to death cap mushrooms. Patterson said she was “shocked and confused”. “I haven’t seen how death cap mushrooms might have been produced during meals,” she said.
Death Cap Mushroom is poisonous. – William West/AFP/Getty Images/File
Earlier Wednesday, Patterson told the court she did not see the website allegedly showing the location of the Death Cap mushroom.
She said she knew death cap mushrooms and searched online to find out if they were growing in the area. She said she found they didn’t.
Patterson also told her trial Wednesday that she foraged mushrooms at the Korumburra Botanical Garden in May 2023 and may have picked some around the oak trees. The court had previously heard that the death cap mushrooms grew near the oak tree.
Patterson said she would dehydrate and she didn’t want to use it immediately and store it in a plastic container in the storage room. She said around that time, she also bought dried mushrooms from an Asian grocery store in Melbourne. Because they have a spicy smell, she said she put them in a plastic container in the pantry.
Mandy asked: “Do you have any memory to put wild mushrooms you dehydrated in May or June 2023 into containers that already contain other dried mushrooms?”
Patterson replied: “Yes, I did.”
Later, Patterson recalls a conversation she had with her husband Simon because his parents were very ill in the hospital. She said she mentioned that she had dried mushrooms in the dehydrator. She said to the trial: “He said to me, ‘Is that how did you poison my parents with that kind of dehydrated person?'”
She said his comments made her “think a lot about a lot of things”.
“It reminded me of all the time I (dehydrator) and how I dried the foraging mushrooms a few weeks ago, and I started thinking if they went to the container with Chinese mushrooms in the container, maybe it happened.”
Korumburra pastor Ian Wilkinson and his wife Heather Wilkinson were poisoned. – Saviors Australia Museum/Facebook
Patterson said she became “really scared” and she was “crazy” when she came home from the health center. She said she felt “responsible” because she cooked the meal and served it, “people were sick.”
On August 2, Patterson said she placed the kids in school and then took the dehydrator to the dump. She said child protection officers would visit her house that afternoon and she was “feared” about conversations about meals and dehydrators. “I’m afraid they’ll blame me for this… to make everyone sick,” she said.
“I’m afraid they remove the kids,” she added.
When asked if she realized that the Death Cap Mushroom might have been dining, Patterson said: “No.”
She said she believes there may be evidence of “any foraging mushrooms” in the dehydrator.
Patterson also told the court that she was responsible for resetting cell phones at three factories. Her son did it for the first time. She said she knew there were images of mushrooms and dehydrators in her Google photos. “I just panic and don’t want them to see them,” she said. When asked who she was talking about, she said, “detective.”
Patterson’s evidence will continue on Thursday.
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