Mushroom poisonings leave Victorian towns of Leongatha and Korumburra divided
Suspicion lines the pot-holed roads of Leongatha. Rumours are circulating about what happened at Erin Patterson’s lunch.
Suspicion lines the pot-holed roads of Leongatha.
The heaviest winter fog for weeks smothered parts of South Gippsland on Tuesday, leaving residents to inch their way to work while contemplating the deaths of three elderly community leaders as the local newspaper screamed “POISONED’’.
At Korumburra’s Baptist Church overlooking the main road to Leongatha, about 135km southeast of Melbourne, five bunches of flowers were resting on the path leading to the small childcare centre, with cards lamenting the death of pastor Ian Wilkinson’s wife Heather and the state of her critically ill husband.
There were flowers from friends and flowers from the nearby Leongatha Uniting Church. So sorry, read one card.
For the Wilkinsons’ neighbour of a decade Gina Clement, the three deaths and the nature of Ian Wilkinson’s critical illness – he will probably need a liver transplant – have floored her.
“They were the best,” she said. “I believe in God, too, and I’m hoping it was an accident. It’s just so hard to believe.”
Leongatha and Korumburra are towns divided, the locals unsure how to process the fact that police named mother of two Erin Patterson as a suspect in the deaths of three people, including her former in-laws, Don and Gail Patterson, or reports that Erin’s ex-husband last year battled a mystery gut illness after collapsing at home and was placed into an induced coma.
Erin Patterson, 48, had, until about a year ago, lived not far from the Wilkinsons in Korumburra, population 4724, and, again, not far from the Pattersons.
She had edited The Burra Flyer, a small magazine that spruiked local events, businesses and school milestones.
Don Patterson was a former high school teacher and the four dead or critically ill were all aged in their 60s and 70s; they were big contributors to the community.
The dead or sick were fed what police believe were death cap mushrooms on July 29. Death cap mushrooms are so toxic they can cause organ failure. Police are now carrying out forensic testing on a dehydrator that was found at a nearby tip.
Jenny Lake, who was in Korumburra from the nearby town of Foster, is like many who wonder how a lunch with seven people down a quiet country lane could go so wrong.
Erin Patterson and her two children, who were fed a different meal, did not fall critically ill.
In the main street of Korumburra, Ms Lake said it was common knowledge to be careful of mushrooms: “I know the difference, you can just tell. The ones around the trees are no good.’’
Just over a year ago when Erin Patterson split from her husband, she moved into a newly built double-storey home overlooking hills at Leongatha, which is about 15km from Korumburra.
On Tuesday, a single bunch of flowers with an unopened card was sitting on her fence post, 10m from the first media car waiting for signs of her return. She had left the house in her small red SUV.
A nearby friend described her as gentle but naive, full of kindness and lacking ill-will.
“She is a good person with good values. Maybe a bit naive but not someone who would deliberately do this,’’ the friend said.
Ms Patterson has publicly declared her innocence, telling the media: “I loved them and I’m devastated they are gone.”
Still, rumours are circulating widely in the district about what happened at lunch and what had been occurring in the lead-up.
Police on Tuesday did not add to what the head of the homicide squad said in naming Ms Patterson as a suspect and stressing it may have been an accident.
It’s a 50-50 story with the presumption of innocence looming largest. No one yet even knows who sourced the mushrooms.
Detective Inspector Dean Thomas was clear on Monday “that we just don’t know at this point’’ and that the poisoning “could be very innocent’’.
The South Gippsland Sentinel-Times splashed with the deaths on Tuesday, running on page three a photograph from a real estate website showing where Ms Patterson’s new house was built. The block of land went for $260,000 and among the promotional photos, it reported, was a cluster of brightly coloured mushrooms on the property.
To the untrained eye, they would have best been avoided.
