Mushroom murder trial: Erin Patterson told online friends about ‘controlling’ husband
Three online friends Erin Patterson met through a true crime Facebook group gave evidence that she thought her estranged husband was ‘demanding’ and at times put his church before their family.
Erin Patterson told a close group of online friends she was “hiding mushrooms in everything” after buying a dehydrator, a court has heard, and later turned to them for tips on how to cook the perfect beef Wellington.
Three women she befriended on Facebook through a shared interest in convicted baby-killer Keli Lane gave evidence in the Victorian Supreme Court on Monday, with one saying “super sleuth” Ms Patterson became well-known for getting “information quickly from the internet”.
The online friends, whom Ms Patterson confided in but has never met in real life, also testified to her gripes with her “controlling” estranged husband, Simon, with whom she clashed over religion, and believed often put the church before his family.
Ms Patterson, 50, is on trial for the murder of three of Simon’s relatives – his parents, Don and Gail Patterson, and his aunt, Heather Wilkinson – after serving them beef Wellington laced with death cap mushrooms at a July 2023 lunch in her Leongatha home.
She has also been charged with the attempted murder of Wilkinson’s husband, Ian Wilkinson, who ate the meal but survived after a lengthy hospital stay.
Ms Patterson has pleaded not guilty and has always denied wrongdoing.
The Supreme Court, sitting in Morwell 155km east of Melbourne, on Monday heard evidence from three witnesses who became friends with Ms Patterson through a Facebook group in which members discussed the Lane case.
All three women gave evidence via videolink.
Some members splintered off from the larger Keli Lane Facebook group when it dissolved in 2019, the court heard, and Ms Patterson joined various smaller private chats where politics, royalty, news and personal lives were discussed.
“It was a small enough group where we did lean into each other’s lives and we were a support for each other,” online friend Christine Hunt told the jury.
Ms Hunt said Ms Patterson shared information with the group about her interests, and struggles in her personal life.
“Lots about her kids, Lego, buying the house at Leongatha. Just general life-type stuff,” she said. “Information about herself, her husband. Just the challenges she was facing, the difficulties she had as a single mum.”
Ms Hunt, a manager of a not-for-profit from Queensland, said she remembered Ms Patterson referring to Mr Patterson as being coercive and controlling.
She said the pair clashed over religion – Ms Patterson describing herself as an atheist while Mr Patterson was dedicated to the Baptist faith – particularly when it came to having opposing views on divorce.
“She being an atheist and Simon being from a very strong Baptist background, she found that very challenging, is what she shared with us, anyway,” Ms Hunt said.
“She found that challenging and in particular the decisions around things like divorce, separation, how the kids should be educated and brought up. She found all that very controlling and demanding.”
Ms Hunt also said Ms Patterson described Mr Patterson’s parents as demanding, and wanting their grandchildren to receive a faith-based education. The court previously heard Ms Patterson became a Christian soon after meeting Mr Patterson.
“She’d used the word ‘coercive’ at times and also that his family were very demanding and that she was really challenged by their demands, and particularly around the kids attending a faith-based … school, so there were challenges,” Ms Hunt said.
“She didn’t like it. The demands that were put on around taking the kids away and if the kids were taken away. She seemed unsettled whenever the kids were away.”
Ms Hunt said Ms Patterson was “well regarded” within the group, and known to be a “super sleuth” and a “really good researcher” who could quickly find information on the internet.
The court on Monday heard evidence from a second online friend, Daniela Barkley, that Ms Patterson was not happy with Mr Patterson’s “cleanliness”.
“It was so difficult, I don’t know, to get along with him, I guess,” she told the court.
Ms Barkley said Ms Patterson was “excited” to buy a Sunbeam dehydrator, which she used to dry out mushrooms and hide them in food for her children.
She also said Ms Patterson had asked the group whether anyone had cooked a beef Wellington.
Ms Barkley, a vegetarian, joked she should instead make a “tofu Wellington”. But a third friend, Jenny Hay, told the court she gave Ms Patterson tips on how to wrap the pastry to “stop it being soggy”.
The jury was shown messages purportedly sent by Ms Patterson in which she told her online friends she had been “hiding powdered mushrooms in everything”.
“Mixed it into chocolate brownies yesterday, the kids had no idea,” she said in one message.
In another, she spoke to the power of the dehydrator.
“So fun fact, the dehydrator reduces mushroom mass by 90%,” she said. “Do you think Woolies would mind if I brought the dehydrator into their vegetable section and dry things before I buy them?”
Ms Patterson also sent images of the mushrooms being dehydrated. The images, shown to the court, showed dozens of fungi dried out across separate racks that slotted into the machine.
“She was a bit excited that she’d purchased a food dehydrator,” Ms Barkley told the court.
The court has previously heard that Ms Patterson had dumped a dehydrator at a tip near Leongatha in South Gippsland, which is near where the lunch was held.
She told officers in a police interview after the incident that she had never bought a dehydrator, but later admitted she “might have owned one years ago”.
Ms Hay, a Tasmanian social worker, said Ms Patterson “seemed to really like mushrooms”.
“I remember her making mushroom soup,” Ms Hay said. “I remember her talking about blitzing it to make powder, to put in things so that the kids would eat it.”
Ms Hay said Ms Patterson contacted her about a week after the fatal lunch, and told her she had bought the poisoned mushrooms from an Asian grocer.
During a 10-minute phone call, Ms Hay said Ms Patterson told her her children had eaten part of the Wellington. “She said that they ate some of the meal and they were checked out at the hospital,” Ms Hay told the court.
Mr Patterson previously denied asking his estranged wife if she used a dehydrator to prepare a beef Wellington meal to allegedly kill the three victims.
He told the Supreme Court that he did not make the allegation on July 31, 2023, that she had used the machine to prepare the meal.
Defence counsel Colin Mandy SC suggested to him that he had asked Ms Patterson – when the children weren’t in the room in a Melbourne hospital – whether she used a dehydrator to poison his family members.
“I did not say that to Erin,” he replied firmly in front of the jury.
He also denied to the court that he had kept the accused under constant surveillance while at the same hospital.
“That’s not my style,’’ he said.
Mr Patterson had given evidence for two full court days but his first day in the dock was last Thursday.
During his testimony, he detailed his turbulent marriage to Ms Patterson, which descended into acrimony in late 2022 following a dispute over their financial arrangements.
At the time, she had discovered he listed himself as “separated” on his tax return. Upset, she requested he start paying her formal child support so she could obtain the family tax benefit.
The court has heard Mr Patterson further upset Ms Patterson when he refused to pay the children’s school and medical fees separately from money paid through official channels.
On Monday, the court was shown messages sent by Ms Patterson to a group chat with Don, Gail and Simon Patterson, in which she said she had “foolishly trusted” her estranged husband to do what was right for his family.
Ms Patterson said she would have been entitled to about $30,000 in child support from Mr Patterson while he was working at estate development company LandGipps, but she had not claimed it.
“Now I have no income from a job because I quit it to care for the kids and if he reverses the single thing then I’m not able to claim family tax benefit and I’ll not be entitled to any child support,” she said in the message.
She accused Mr Patterson of making the “unconscionable” decision to cancel paying for their children’s school fees as “punishment” for her claiming child support.
She acknowledged it was “uncomfortable and awkward” for Don and Gail Patterson to be involved, but said she would continue to message them.
“Simon seems to be under the misapprehension that a child support assessment covers every expense for the children under the sun,” she said. “That’s just not the case. It covers basic care and basic schooling including a public school education.”
The trial continues on Tuesday.
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