July 7, 2025 • 10 mins
It’s the case that has had people from all over the world talking. And today, after a 10-week trial, the jury returned a verdict.
Erin Patterson has been found guilty of triple murder, killing her in-laws, Gail and Don Patterson, and also Gail’s sister Heather Wilkinson. Patterson was also found guilty of the attempted murder of Heather’s husband, Ian Wilkinson.
Ian Wilkinson was the only survivor of the now infamous lunch of beef wellington, which a jury has now decided Patterson deliberately laced with death cap mushrooms.
One of the reporters who covered the trial for The Age, Erin Pearson, was there for the verdict and reports from outside court in this episode of The Morning Edition.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
S1 (00:01):
From the newsrooms of the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.
This is the morning edition. I'm Samantha Selinger Morris. It's Monday,
July 7th. It's the case that has had people from
all over the world talking the mushrooms case. And today,
after a ten week trial, the jury returned a verdict.
(00:24):
Erin Paterson has been found guilty of triple murder, killing
her in-laws, Gail and Don Paterson. And also Gail's sister,
Heather Wilkinson. Paterson was also found guilty of the attempted
murder of Heather's husband, Ian Wilkinson. Ian Wilkinson was the
only survivor of the now infamous lunch of beef Wellington,
(00:45):
which a jury has now decided. Paterson deliberately laced with
death cap mushrooms. One of the reporters who covered the
trial for The Age and the Sydney Morning Herald, Aaron Pearson,
was there for the verdict today and she joins me
on the podcast. So, Erin, you have been in Morwell
in southeast Victoria where this trial has been taking place.
You've been there for the whole ten weeks, but you've
(01:07):
really been on the edge of your seat for the
last week. While we've all been waiting for this jury
to return its verdict. So just tell us how the
day unfolded.
S2 (01:14):
Yeah. It's one of those weird feelings waiting for a
jury verdict where everybody wants to know when it's going
to happen. And, um, nobody really knows. It's the one
thing you can never predict in a trial is how
long it's going to take, what the verdict is going
to be, all of these types of things. We got
the alert at lunchtime, actually, and we're always told that
the jury can't return a verdict between 1 and 215.
(01:36):
So that's the only time we can really duck off within,
you know, a five minute radius to a cafe, get
a coffee. And it was there that we got the
email and, um, ran the two blocks back to court,
huffing and puffing to try and get in there. There's
only a very few seats in the courtroom, and far
more members of the press and public here than could fit,
so there was a lot of elbowing. And we got
(01:59):
inside and I sat in the back row, which is
where the media have sat for most of the trial
so far. That's also the row that's closest to Aaron Patterson.
So I wanted to be right near, um, Aaron herself
so I could see her reaction when the verdict was
handed down. And that's when we heard the knock on
the door, which indicates that the jury are coming in. And, um,
(02:20):
one by one, they filed in to a couple of
rows into the jury box there. And, um, it was
the foreperson who delivered the verdicts. Now, they started with
the attempted murder charge relating to Ian Wilkinson. Now he's
the pastor who survived the lunch but lost his wife. Um,
that was guilty instantly. Everybody's heads turned in the courtroom
(02:42):
behind us around to see what Aaron Patterson was doing.
And there was no emotion from her. But, um, as
soon as we turned her heads, we heard the next verdict.
And we heard guilty, guilty, guilty another three times in
a row for murder. It was her defense team that
seemed the most surprised or the most defeated, should I say? Um,
they were sort of leaning back in their chairs, um,
(03:04):
looking a bit stunned, to be perfectly honest. The prosecution,
I couldn't see their faces, but they were staring straight
at the jury. But but Aaron Patterson, no emotion at all.
S1 (03:13):
I really want to turn now to the evidence, because
we can't, of course, read the minds of the jury.
But what for you was perhaps the clincher, you know,
evidence that really stands out as perhaps having, you know,
really been instrumental here in, in securing something of a
of a guilty verdict.
S2 (03:27):
Yeah. You're right. It's so hard to know what pieces
of evidence stick with, with different jurors. We know we
had more men on the jury than women. Um, whether
or not certain things stick with them, you really don't know?
There was a lot of evidence about Aaron Patterson resetting
her mobile phone in the aftermath of the lunch and
around the time of the lunch, and in the lead
(03:48):
up to that and and then giving what the prosecution
said was a dummy phone to police, which essentially had
nothing on it. That was a piece of evidence that
there was a lot, a lot of conversation about. We
also heard a lot about whether or not Aaron Patterson
was really sick, and why she had really, really different
symptoms to everybody else. Significantly different. Um, you know, we've
(04:11):
had three people who died and one who really nearly
lost his life. And Aaron Patterson's symptoms were more sort
of described as having a little bit of diarrhea. And
for someone to have eaten the same lunch, I think
there was a lot of questions around that as well.
And also the dumping of the dehydrator. So her defense
team said she did all of that in a panic.
She admits to doing that. She admits to resetting the
(04:32):
phone and and dumping the dehydrator, but maintained that was
what she did in in a panic. And I think
that was something that really stuck with me and stuck
with a lot of, um, members of the public and
the press who attended the court. They seem to be
some pretty hot topics, um, during the trial, but you
could see the jurors sort of taking notes and, um,
and really watching what was going on. There was some evidence,
(04:53):
of course, that was a little bit more dry. This
was a, a very, very long trial. But I think
those pieces of evidence in particular really resonated with a
lot of people.
S1 (05:03):
And I wanted to ask you about one of the
things that the prosecutor, Nanette Rogers SC, flagged when she
first laid out her opening arguments to the jury. And
that was that, you know, a motive for the crime
may never actually be known, but I really wanted to
ask you your thoughts. You know, was there any suggestion
in court as to why Aaron Patterson committed these crimes
that a jury has now found she's guilty of?
S2 (05:24):
It was an obvious piece of information that was missing
from the very beginning. This is something where they really
nobody was able to answer that question. And we know
and Annette Rogers really reminded everybody that, um, on the
jury that you don't need motive to prove murder. Um,
it's not one of the four elements that need to
(05:44):
be ticked off in order for the jury to be
satisfied that they've they've reached those, those elements beyond reasonable doubt.
But I think it's human nature to question why I'm
a journalist who's covered many, many criminal trials or been
to many crime scenes, and you can't help but ask why? Um,
it's yeah, it's just human nature to want answers to
those sorts of questions. And I think it's if you
(06:05):
speak to a psychologist, it's probably in the hope of
trying to make sense of something that's so horrific. It's
just the worst thing that can happen in our community. And, um,
when you can't make sense of it, I think it
makes it even more difficult, more difficult for people to
move on from, more difficult for communities to come to
terms with. Um, and it must be horrendously difficult for
the families of the victims to try and come to
(06:26):
terms with as well. But yeah, there certainly hasn't been
any big suggestions, nothing mentioned in court at all. And
I think it's something people will be asking for many
years to come.
S1 (06:35):
Wow. And so I guess what happens now? Do we
know when Aaron Patterson will be sentenced and what kind
of jail time she could possibly get?
S2 (06:42):
So she's she's, um, taken away from court and, um,
and heading to prison. Heading to a. Heading to a
women's prison now for the foreseeable future. The next step
in this sort of process is what's called a plea hearing.
It's like a pre-sentence hearing where it can run over
a number of days, and it's really where the prosecution
and defense battle it out. As to telling the judge
(07:05):
why Aaron Patterson should get a certain sentence, um, it
should be this this long or this short for all
of these different reasons. And we often hear from victims
families who may read statements or, or these types of things.
Every plea hearing is a little bit different, but that's
typically what we see. We don't have a date for
that yet. We don't know when that is going to happen. Um,
we're expecting to come back to court, uh, maybe next
(07:28):
month for a bit of a mention hearing. And we
hope that hearing will map out what the next few
months will look like for Aaron Patterson after we have
what's called a plea hearing, that's when sentencing occurs. Um,
we don't know when that's going to occur or what
that's going to look like. We expect it to be
back here in Morwell. Um, but we hope to have
more information on what what that, um, mapping might look
(07:49):
like come next month.
S1 (07:51):
And what about an appeal? I mean, can and will
Erin Patterson appeal this verdict and the sentence?
S2 (07:56):
Yeah. There's very, um, tight reasons why you can appeal.
You can't just appeal a verdict because you don't like it.
You have to appeal a verdict on certain legal grounds.
You can also appeal a sentence. And and that's typically
when most, um, defense barristers will lodge an appeal is
after sentence. They have 28 days after a sentence to
lodge an appeal. Of course that can happen sooner, but
(08:18):
it's very rare that that happens. I would expect that
we would see that in the aftermath of the sentencing.
That could be later this year. It could be early
next year. We really don't know. There's lots of different
factors that come into play as to when when those
things could happen. But, um, yeah, look, there is a
good chance she will appeal.
S1 (08:37):
And Erin, just to wrap up, I really was hoping
you could give us a sense of how significant this
case has been. I mean, we know that it's had
people all around the world talking about it. It's attracted
true crime addicts to town just to watch the case.
I think one of the true crime addicts even got
a tattoo. So what has this been like? Like in
all your years of reporting on criminal trials, have you
(08:57):
ever seen anything like this?
S2 (08:59):
The only time I've seen this many media and I'm
looking around as we're speaking. I was just having a
chat to somebody from the BBC. Um, there's quite a
number of journos from, like, the London Times and things
like that that are here. Um, I've also, in the
last five minutes, had interview requests from Dubai, Ireland, places
that you would never imagine are are really gaining significant
(09:19):
interest in this case. I've never seen anything like it.
There's something that I guess grabs people's interest when it's
to do with a poisoning. Perhaps we all try and
figure out in the media why certain cases captivate people,
but we do know it's being turned into documentaries. Um,
I host a podcast about it. Um, there's all sorts
of different mediums that are coming in and, and having
(09:41):
a look at what's going on.
S1 (09:43):
Well, it is it is a horribly sad story, of course,
but we're lucky that you've been there covering it. So
thank you so much for your time.
S2 (09:50):
No worries. Thank you.
S1 (09:55):
Today's episode was produced by Tammy Mills with technical assistance
by Cormac Lally. Tom McKendrick is our head of audio.
To listen to our episodes as soon as they drop,
follow the Morning Edition on Apple, Spotify or wherever you
listen to podcasts. Our newsrooms are powered by subscriptions, so
to support independent journalism, visit The Age or smh.com.au. And
(10:21):
to stay up to date, sign up to our Morningedition
newsletter to receive a summary of the day's most important
news in your inbox every morning. Links are in the show. Notes.
I'm Samantha Selinger. Morris. Thanks for listening.
From the newsrooms of the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.
This is the morning edition. I'm Samantha Selinger Morris. It's Monday,
July 7th. It's the case that has had people from
all over the world talking the mushrooms case. And today,
after a ten week trial, the jury returned a verdict.
(00:24):
Erin Paterson has been found guilty of triple murder, killing
her in-laws, Gail and Don Paterson. And also Gail's sister,
Heather Wilkinson. Paterson was also found guilty of the attempted
murder of Heather's husband, Ian Wilkinson. Ian Wilkinson was the
only survivor of the now infamous lunch of beef Wellington,
(00:45):
which a jury has now decided. Paterson deliberately laced with
death cap mushrooms. One of the reporters who covered the
trial for The Age and the Sydney Morning Herald, Aaron Pearson,
was there for the verdict today and she joins me
on the podcast. So, Erin, you have been in Morwell
in southeast Victoria where this trial has been taking place.
You've been there for the whole ten weeks, but you've
(01:07):
really been on the edge of your seat for the
last week. While we've all been waiting for this jury
to return its verdict. So just tell us how the
day unfolded.
S2 (01:14):
Yeah. It's one of those weird feelings waiting for a
jury verdict where everybody wants to know when it's going
to happen. And, um, nobody really knows. It's the one
thing you can never predict in a trial is how
long it's going to take, what the verdict is going
to be, all of these types of things. We got
the alert at lunchtime, actually, and we're always told that
the jury can't return a verdict between 1 and 215.
(01:36):
So that's the only time we can really duck off within,
you know, a five minute radius to a cafe, get
a coffee. And it was there that we got the
email and, um, ran the two blocks back to court,
huffing and puffing to try and get in there. There's
only a very few seats in the courtroom, and far
more members of the press and public here than could fit,
so there was a lot of elbowing. And we got
(01:59):
inside and I sat in the back row, which is
where the media have sat for most of the trial
so far. That's also the row that's closest to Aaron Patterson.
So I wanted to be right near, um, Aaron herself
so I could see her reaction when the verdict was
handed down. And that's when we heard the knock on
the door, which indicates that the jury are coming in. And, um,
(02:20):
one by one, they filed in to a couple of
rows into the jury box there. And, um, it was
the foreperson who delivered the verdicts. Now, they started with
the attempted murder charge relating to Ian Wilkinson. Now he's
the pastor who survived the lunch but lost his wife. Um,
that was guilty instantly. Everybody's heads turned in the courtroom
(02:42):
behind us around to see what Aaron Patterson was doing.
And there was no emotion from her. But, um, as
soon as we turned her heads, we heard the next verdict.
And we heard guilty, guilty, guilty another three times in
a row for murder. It was her defense team that
seemed the most surprised or the most defeated, should I say? Um,
they were sort of leaning back in their chairs, um,
(03:04):
looking a bit stunned, to be perfectly honest. The prosecution,
I couldn't see their faces, but they were staring straight
at the jury. But but Aaron Patterson, no emotion at all.
S1 (03:13):
I really want to turn now to the evidence, because
we can't, of course, read the minds of the jury.
But what for you was perhaps the clincher, you know,
evidence that really stands out as perhaps having, you know,
really been instrumental here in, in securing something of a
of a guilty verdict.
S2 (03:27):
Yeah. You're right. It's so hard to know what pieces
of evidence stick with, with different jurors. We know we
had more men on the jury than women. Um, whether
or not certain things stick with them, you really don't know?
There was a lot of evidence about Aaron Patterson resetting
her mobile phone in the aftermath of the lunch and
around the time of the lunch, and in the lead
(03:48):
up to that and and then giving what the prosecution
said was a dummy phone to police, which essentially had
nothing on it. That was a piece of evidence that
there was a lot, a lot of conversation about. We
also heard a lot about whether or not Aaron Patterson
was really sick, and why she had really, really different
symptoms to everybody else. Significantly different. Um, you know, we've
(04:11):
had three people who died and one who really nearly
lost his life. And Aaron Patterson's symptoms were more sort
of described as having a little bit of diarrhea. And
for someone to have eaten the same lunch, I think
there was a lot of questions around that as well.
And also the dumping of the dehydrator. So her defense
team said she did all of that in a panic.
She admits to doing that. She admits to resetting the
(04:32):
phone and and dumping the dehydrator, but maintained that was
what she did in in a panic. And I think
that was something that really stuck with me and stuck
with a lot of, um, members of the public and
the press who attended the court. They seem to be
some pretty hot topics, um, during the trial, but you
could see the jurors sort of taking notes and, um,
and really watching what was going on. There was some evidence,
(04:53):
of course, that was a little bit more dry. This
was a, a very, very long trial. But I think
those pieces of evidence in particular really resonated with a
lot of people.
S1 (05:03):
And I wanted to ask you about one of the
things that the prosecutor, Nanette Rogers SC, flagged when she
first laid out her opening arguments to the jury. And
that was that, you know, a motive for the crime
may never actually be known, but I really wanted to
ask you your thoughts. You know, was there any suggestion
in court as to why Aaron Patterson committed these crimes
that a jury has now found she's guilty of?
S2 (05:24):
It was an obvious piece of information that was missing
from the very beginning. This is something where they really
nobody was able to answer that question. And we know
and Annette Rogers really reminded everybody that, um, on the
jury that you don't need motive to prove murder. Um,
it's not one of the four elements that need to
(05:44):
be ticked off in order for the jury to be
satisfied that they've they've reached those, those elements beyond reasonable doubt.
But I think it's human nature to question why I'm
a journalist who's covered many, many criminal trials or been
to many crime scenes, and you can't help but ask why? Um,
it's yeah, it's just human nature to want answers to
those sorts of questions. And I think it's if you
(06:05):
speak to a psychologist, it's probably in the hope of
trying to make sense of something that's so horrific. It's
just the worst thing that can happen in our community. And, um,
when you can't make sense of it, I think it
makes it even more difficult, more difficult for people to
move on from, more difficult for communities to come to
terms with. Um, and it must be horrendously difficult for
the families of the victims to try and come to
(06:26):
terms with as well. But yeah, there certainly hasn't been
any big suggestions, nothing mentioned in court at all. And
I think it's something people will be asking for many
years to come.
S1 (06:35):
Wow. And so I guess what happens now? Do we
know when Aaron Patterson will be sentenced and what kind
of jail time she could possibly get?
S2 (06:42):
So she's she's, um, taken away from court and, um,
and heading to prison. Heading to a. Heading to a
women's prison now for the foreseeable future. The next step
in this sort of process is what's called a plea hearing.
It's like a pre-sentence hearing where it can run over
a number of days, and it's really where the prosecution
and defense battle it out. As to telling the judge
(07:05):
why Aaron Patterson should get a certain sentence, um, it
should be this this long or this short for all
of these different reasons. And we often hear from victims
families who may read statements or, or these types of things.
Every plea hearing is a little bit different, but that's
typically what we see. We don't have a date for
that yet. We don't know when that is going to happen. Um,
we're expecting to come back to court, uh, maybe next
(07:28):
month for a bit of a mention hearing. And we
hope that hearing will map out what the next few
months will look like for Aaron Patterson after we have
what's called a plea hearing, that's when sentencing occurs. Um,
we don't know when that's going to occur or what
that's going to look like. We expect it to be
back here in Morwell. Um, but we hope to have
more information on what what that, um, mapping might look
(07:49):
like come next month.
S1 (07:51):
And what about an appeal? I mean, can and will
Erin Patterson appeal this verdict and the sentence?
S2 (07:56):
Yeah. There's very, um, tight reasons why you can appeal.
You can't just appeal a verdict because you don't like it.
You have to appeal a verdict on certain legal grounds.
You can also appeal a sentence. And and that's typically
when most, um, defense barristers will lodge an appeal is
after sentence. They have 28 days after a sentence to
lodge an appeal. Of course that can happen sooner, but
(08:18):
it's very rare that that happens. I would expect that
we would see that in the aftermath of the sentencing.
That could be later this year. It could be early
next year. We really don't know. There's lots of different
factors that come into play as to when when those
things could happen. But, um, yeah, look, there is a
good chance she will appeal.
S1 (08:37):
And Erin, just to wrap up, I really was hoping
you could give us a sense of how significant this
case has been. I mean, we know that it's had
people all around the world talking about it. It's attracted
true crime addicts to town just to watch the case.
I think one of the true crime addicts even got
a tattoo. So what has this been like? Like in
all your years of reporting on criminal trials, have you
(08:57):
ever seen anything like this?
S2 (08:59):
The only time I've seen this many media and I'm
looking around as we're speaking. I was just having a
chat to somebody from the BBC. Um, there's quite a
number of journos from, like, the London Times and things
like that that are here. Um, I've also, in the
last five minutes, had interview requests from Dubai, Ireland, places
that you would never imagine are are really gaining significant
(09:19):
interest in this case. I've never seen anything like it.
There's something that I guess grabs people's interest when it's
to do with a poisoning. Perhaps we all try and
figure out in the media why certain cases captivate people,
but we do know it's being turned into documentaries. Um,
I host a podcast about it. Um, there's all sorts
of different mediums that are coming in and, and having
(09:41):
a look at what's going on.
S1 (09:43):
Well, it is it is a horribly sad story, of course,
but we're lucky that you've been there covering it. So
thank you so much for your time.
S2 (09:50):
No worries. Thank you.
S1 (09:55):
Today's episode was produced by Tammy Mills with technical assistance
by Cormac Lally. Tom McKendrick is our head of audio.
To listen to our episodes as soon as they drop,
follow the Morning Edition on Apple, Spotify or wherever you
listen to podcasts. Our newsrooms are powered by subscriptions, so
to support independent journalism, visit The Age or smh.com.au. And
(10:21):
to stay up to date, sign up to our Morningedition
newsletter to receive a summary of the day's most important
news in your inbox every morning. Links are in the show. Notes.
I'm Samantha Selinger. Morris. Thanks for listening.
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