Ian Wilkinson, the only guest to survive Erin Patterson’s beef Wellington lunch, gives evidence
Ian Wilkinson, the lone guest to survive the 2023 lunch, managed to laugh and smile for much of his evidence but accused murderer Erin Patterson became emotional.
Ian Wilkinson has the unwanted distinction of being the only guest to survive Erin Patterson’s lunch of beef Wellington served – accidentally or otherwise – with death cap mushrooms.
When he arrived in court on Tuesday to give evidence, he looked briefly at the dock in the direction of Patterson with a deadpan face before turning his attention to reaching the witness stand.
For much of his evidence, he managed to laugh and smile, but on that brief entry into the courtroom, he showed, as the cliche goes, no emotion when he looked where Patterson was sitting.
Shortly afterwards, as Wilkinson was giving his evidence, Patterson became emotional.
Wilkinson, 71, of Korumburra, told the court of the debilitating impact the mushrooms had on him and his late wife, Heather, who died in 2023 after the meal.
The pair were smashed by the effects of the mushrooms, he said, crippled by vomiting and diarrhoea late in the night on either July 29, 2023, or the morning after.
They were so ill they were forced to camp out next to the two toilets in their Korumburra house, before being rushed to the local hospital, Leongatha Hospital, Dandenong Hospital and ultimately the Austin Hospital.
Heather Wilkinson, 66, Gail and Don Patterson, 70, were all gone by August 4 and August 5, the court has already heard.
Wilkinson said while he knew Patterson, they weren’t especially close, estimating that the accused went to the local Baptist church, where he is pastor, maybe once a month, although sometimes more regularly.
He told the court his wife would have seen Patterson more often, but overall there wasn’t a high degree of familiarity, adding “we didn’t consider the relationship was close”.
The accused, he added, seemed normal to him: “She just seemed like an ordinary person.’’
Wilkinson said when Heather was invited to the lunch at Patterson’s house in nearby Leongatha, South Gippsland, no reason had been given for the event.
He told the court on the other occasions he had been at Patterson’s house, the conversations had not been conducted indoors.
“I was very happy to be invited, yes,’’ Wilkinson said.
He then outlined for the first time publicly in court what happened on the day of the lunch.
The two elderly couples arrived at the Leongatha home of Patterson about 12.30pm, bearing a cake and a fruit platter, he said.
They had engaged in small talk, the court heard, toured part of the garden outside the house and gathered in the kitchen/living area; initially, Patterson was on the kitchen side of the bench, with the older women on the other side.
Ian Wilkinson and Don Patterson, the court heard, were further inside the living room, but he had still seen Erin Patterson mashing the potatoes. “Erin plated up the food,’’ he told the court.
Not long after describing the layout of the kitchen, Ian Wilkinson’s court chair started to subside for the first time, slowing down his explanation of what had happened. It would later pretty much collapse, prompting judge Christopher Beale to declare in jest: “We do that to all our witnesses.”
Wilkinson alleged that Erin Patterson rejected an offer to help with the serving of the food.
He said he watched Patterson, 50, mash potatoes and serve the beef Wellington but she had refused help from Gail and Heather.
“The only preparation I saw was potatoes being mashed,” he told the court. “I saw food being plated up, that’s all I saw.”
Heather and Gail were offering to help with the food, but the offer was rejected, he said, and Erin Patterson plated up.
“No, the offer was rejected,’’ he said.
Ian Wilkinson also said the four guests had their food served on large grey plates, while Patterson had served the meal to herself on a smaller tan/orange plate, although the defence later questioned the make-up of the crockery.
The court heard the meal of beef Wellington, potatoes and beans was served and the group later discussed Patterson’s alleged cancer diagnosis.
The court has earlier heard that she does not have cancer and the defence later questioned whether Patterson had claimed at the lunch that she definitely had the disease.
Wilkinson said the discussion about cancer was truncated when one of the children and a friend had returned to the Patterson house on the edge of Leongatha, but they had prayed for Erin and her family.
The court also heard that rather than being one single piece of beef Wellington, it was served in individual parcels.
“It was very much like a pasty,’’ he said.
Wilkinson spent from August 21, 2023, to September 11 of that year in the Austin Hospital’s intensive care unit. He was discharged from ICU and for two weeks sent to another rehabilitation facility.
Wilkinson walked unaided to the witness stand and when he finished his evidence, he sat in the gallery next to a family member who put his arm around his shoulder as the pastor drank, hand shaking, from a bottle of water.
Patterson has pleaded not guilty to four charges; the case is continuing.
Push for Trump to ease up on China
The Albanese government is seeking to persuade the US to take a more considered approach with China when the two superpowers’ treasury and trade officials meet in Switzerland this week.
Unions threatening strike action on Snowy 2.0
Unions are threatening strike action on Australia’s biggest renewable energy project, the trouble plagued Snowy 2.0, as they push for pay rises totalling more than 30 per cent over four years.