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ADVERTISEMENTA court in Australia has found a mother-of-two guilty of murdering three of her estranged husband’s relatives and attempting to murder a fourth after she served them a lunch containing poisonous mushrooms.
A 12-person jury unanimously decided on Monday that Erin Patterson, 50, had deliberately included death cap mushrooms in a beef wellington that she fed her guests at her home in the rural town of Leongatha in the state of Victoria in July 2023.
Don and Gail Patterson, her ex-partner’s parents, and Gail’s sister, Heather Wilkinson, died as a result of the poisoning, while Wilkinson’s husband, Ian, survived after undergoing a liver transplant.
After deliberating for a week, the jurors did not accept the defence’s claim that the deaths had all been a tragic accident.
The prosecution did not specify a motive, but stressed that relations between Patterson and her former partner had deteriorated in the year leading up to the lunch.
Patterson and her defence team admitted that she had lied to police about never having foraged mushrooms and about having a food dehydrator, which she later threw away.
During her testimony, the 50-year-old defendant said she had lied out of fear.
“It was this stupid knee-jerk reaction to dig deeper and keep lying,” she told the court during the trial. “I was just scared, but I shouldn’t have done it.”
The trial, held in the town of Morwell, two hours east of Melbourne, lasted over 10 weeks.
Following the guilty verdict on Monday, Victoria Police requested privacy for the Patterson and Wilkinson families.
“Our thoughts are with the respective families at this time and we acknowledge how difficult these past two years have been for them,” they said.
“We will continue to support them in every way possible following this decision.”
Patterson will be sentenced at a later date and could face life in prison. She and her legal team have 28 days from sentencing to appeal the decision.
