August 8, 2025 • 48 mins
Veteran crime writer Anthony Dowsley is joined by court reporter Ashley Argoon to discuss allegations that Erin Patterson tried to poison her estranged husband on numerous occasions.
The Mushroom Cook team is Brooke Grebert-Craig, Laura Placella, Anthony Dowsley, Jordy Atkinson and Jonty Burton.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
One of the first things that Justice Christopher Bill told
the jury in the trial of Aaron Patterson was something
he said they should immediately put out of their minds.
He told them about charges of attempted murder, charges that
Aaron tried to poison her estranged husband, Simon Patterson, charges
(00:20):
the prosecution had dropped. Now we can finally tell you
about them. He is veteran crime reporter Anthony Dowsley with
court reporter ash Argoon. Stick around until the end because
we have some other news about the podcast that we
think you'll like. I'm Brook Greebert Craig, and this is
(00:41):
the Mushroom.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
I'm here with my esteemed colleague Ashley Argoon. And like
any big story and enormous investigation, there is a backstory
and there are things that the jury did not hear
in the King versus Aaron Patterson. During the pre trial
(01:03):
to this trial, you hear a lot of evidence that
doesn't end up coming out in the big show of
the trial. And incredibly, there were charges laid against Aaron
Patterson for not once, twice, three times, and even a
(01:24):
fourth trying to poison her husband, Simon Patterson. Now, why
didn't the jury hear any of.
Speaker 3 (01:35):
This ash well. Firstly, the charges against Simon Patterson were dropped.
That we know about that because the jury was told
that on the first day of the trial. They were
told to take those charges out of their mind. Because
the community knew. Initially when the police charged Aaron Patterson,
they charged her over attempted murder charges against her husband, Simon,
(01:58):
her strange husband, Simon. But before those charges were dropped,
what the community does not know is that Aaron Patterson
was due to face two trials. The judge, Justice Christopher Biale.
He decided to separate her charges out, one on murder
charges with the lunch and one with the attempted murder
(02:19):
chargers with Simon.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
So we were going to have two trials and the
second trial was going to basically the Simon Patterson poisoning chargeseah.
So on the eve of the trial, the charges of
Aaron Patterson trying to poison her husband were dropped.
Speaker 3 (02:37):
That's right. But before that happened, Simon Patterson had already
taken the witness box for two days in pre trial
in October twenty twenty four, and I, along with other journalists,
were sitting a mere two meters away from him while
he gave evidence over two days, telling the court how
he believed his strange wife had tried to kill him
(02:59):
on multi pu occasions when she invited him on solo
camping trips in the remote bushland in Victoria. What is
a pre trial, Well, as the name suggests, it's the
hearings that come before a trial. So in this instance,
witnesses were called to give evidence, and some of these
witnesses we never heard from in the trial, and much
(03:22):
of this evidence was never delivered to the jury.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
So it's almost like a process of elimination.
Speaker 3 (03:28):
Yeah, it's like the first chance that the defense gets
to cross examine a witness before they get to the
big dance.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
So let's go through these alleged attempted poisonings one by one,
case by case. Sure, so we have a roller coaster
relationship they separated, that would gather together back and forth,
back and forth, back and forth, and first trip that
(03:54):
they take together didn't eventuate.
Speaker 3 (03:56):
No, basically not so prefacing this with in twenty nineteen,
Simon Patterson said that his a strange wife had invited
him to go to South Africa, just the two of them.
So this is four years after they were separated. He
said she'd never done that since they had had their children.
So their son at that time was ten, so it
had been ten years since she'd invited him on a
(04:17):
trip just the two of them. Their trip was canceled
because of COVID instead in twenty twenty one when the
restrictions eased.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
So about November of twenty twenty one, the.
Speaker 3 (04:28):
Suggestion was they go camping instead. We know how they
loved going camping. Their relationship began basically over a shared
love of the outdoors.
Speaker 2 (04:36):
So instead of going to South Africa an exotic trip,
they end up in Wilson's Prom. Yeah, exactly, quite a
nice place.
Speaker 3 (04:43):
A bit different South Africa, yep, but nice.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
So they go to Wilson's Prom. They're going to go camping.
It's without the kids. It's almost like a reconciliation. It's
maybe suppose.
Speaker 3 (04:54):
I mean, we've heard a lot about how they were
wanting to have a good relationship for the children and
themselves as well, and Simon certainly said that in pre trial.
He said they wanted to have a good relationship, and
he believed for a long time that they were going
to reconcile until he didn't, but that's for later in
this podcast.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
So Erin whips up a dish. What's the dish?
Speaker 3 (05:17):
It's penne bolonnaise. So the night before they go camping
in November twenty twenty one, they do a lot of packing,
so Simon's at his house. They're in separate homes at
this stage. Simon's at his house and Erin comes over
with a tupperware container of pasta and she says to
Simon that this is the dinner that her and the
(05:37):
kid's going to eat for dinner that night, and she
brought him some. So they spend a long time packing
and she ends up leaving at about six or seven o'clock.
And later that night he was asked did you eat
the penn a bolonnais? And he says, at about nine
or ten o'clock he did because Aaron was in contact
with him through the night and he said he felt
(05:59):
the words he used was encouraged to eat tea and
not leave it too late. Encouraged. So he ate that
dinner at nine or ten o'clock and then went to
bed for an early start the next morning head to
Aaron's place.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
So does he become sick during the night.
Speaker 3 (06:17):
No, he starts feeling unwell when he arrives at her home,
and he said when he turned up at the front door,
he was greeted by Aaron and his sister Tanya, who
was there to look after their children while they're away.
And he can't remember who of them had said this,
but they asked if he was okay and commented that
he looked gray.
Speaker 2 (06:39):
Okay, so he's not looking the best. But do they
end up going camping?
Speaker 3 (06:44):
Yeah, he said at that stage, he thought he was
just feeling stressed about the idea that he and Aaron
were going to spend some time alone for the first
time in a long time.
Speaker 2 (06:54):
And they've got an airbnb as well.
Speaker 3 (06:56):
Well, I think they book that on the way when
he starts to become ill, right, So at Aaron's house
before they even leave, he vomits a few times in
the toilet. He's quite unwell, and he decides, well, it's
probably just gastro or something. So they decide to push on.
So they get in the car and drive to Wilson's.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
Prom okay, And do they make it?
Speaker 3 (07:18):
No, No, they don't because he's increasingly unwell. They had
to stop the car. I think once for him to
be sick, and in the end, I believe Aaron booked
an airbanba for them because he was so unwell near
Wilson's prom and they spend about forty eight hours at
that airbanb where Simon's throwing up the whole time, and
(07:39):
eventually he says that they do go to hospital, but
there's a bit of a conversation first. It takes a
little while for them to decide to get to hospital.
Speaker 2 (07:48):
So it basically says, I'm pretty sick, I need to
go to hospital.
Speaker 3 (07:51):
He said he had mentioned to his wife he thought
that he needed to go to hospital, and her comment was,
hospitals in our part of the world are a bit
hard to get into. Sometimes sometimes there's a bit of
a weight, so it might be better to just wait
and see and see if the symptoms a bait.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
So he probably thought he had a gastro bug or
something like that. Yeah, he go to hospital.
Speaker 3 (08:15):
In the end, Yeah, yeah, he goes to hospital. Aaron
takes him to hospital and he's in there for a week,
in and out of hospital for about a week, and
he thinks that he has gastro and he says the
doctors can't tell him exactly what's gone on, but he
believes he has gastro and after about a week and
being on a trip, he goes back home to his
own home.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
So oddly enough, Simon comes around to the idea that
he's a little bit suspicious of this sickness that he's had.
We're into the next year, or into twenty twenty two
by this time, and he kind of ribs her about it.
Speaker 3 (08:50):
He does in the new year. He said that it
briefly crosses his mind that maybe Aaron might have poisoned him.
And when she invites him to a makeup trip camping trip,
because as we know, they barely made it to the
first one. They made it to Airbnb outside of Wilson's
prom but they didn't actually go camping, so he says,
she suggests that they go on a makeup trip, this
(09:13):
time to haw Qua outside of Mansfield in May twenty two,
and he said before they went he had a bit
of a joke with her and said to her that
she might put something in the food and poison me.
Speaker 2 (09:24):
But he gets sick again, doesn't he.
Speaker 3 (09:26):
They go away to hau Qua and the preamble for
this dinner that they have in hau Qua that he
believes causes him to be sick. Is that about a
week before they go on their trip, he goes over
to Aaron's place, as he said, he did quite a bit,
and she's running a taste test of spice with the kids,
with the kids and Simon, and she's getting them to
(09:47):
taste different sauces and she says it's because she's making
a curry and she wants to check everyone's spice level
to see how spicy they can handle their food. So
a week later, when they're camping, it's the second night
that they're away in hal Kwa, and he says he's
served up this chicken corma curry and he believes this
is the curry that's specially made to his spice level
(10:10):
from the test.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
The week before. Yeah, okay, So he eats the chicken corma, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (10:15):
Chicken comra and rice. Right, they eat the chicken comra
and rice, and he.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
Believes they eat the same eat the same meal.
Speaker 3 (10:21):
Well, he says that he can see that she's eating
a meal that he believes is the same meal, but
he didn't see how it was prepared or what tuppleware
containers it was packaged in if it was separate or whatever.
He's served up the food, he eats it, and at
about midnight he starts to feel sick.
Speaker 2 (10:39):
So Simon probably has a hot flush.
Speaker 3 (10:43):
He says, he feels hot. He starts feeling hot, especially
in the head.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
Right And when he's describing this, how did he describe
how he felt?
Speaker 3 (10:53):
He said it was about midnight he felt hot, especially
in the head, and he said it led to him
feeling washes and then quite suddenly he needed to vomit.
And then after the vomiting, he started to have diarrhea.
Speaker 2 (11:06):
Okay, so that sounds like food poisoning. Does he go
to hospital again?
Speaker 3 (11:11):
Well, it's nighttime. They're out camping, so they wait until
the sun comes up, and Simon says, you know, hospital time.
So they agree to go to Mansfield Hospital, and he
says that their campsite. Aaron packs up the entire thing.
The only thing that she can't do is lift the
(11:31):
tent into the back of the car, so he has
to help with that, and they head to Mansfield Hospital
where he's there. He stops vomiting that afternoon and he's
discharge the next day.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
So Aaron drives him back to Curramborough the next day. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (11:47):
Yeah, So they head back in the car. Aaron drives
him to his own house and he spends a couple
of days there. I think this is the Friday, and
he's at home by himself for a couple of days
and then something happens on the Sunday. What happens on
the Sunday, Well, he wakes up he is so unwell
and it needs to go to the toilet, but he
(12:08):
can't get himself there. So he says, around about sunrise,
he calls up Eron and asks if she can come
over to his house to help him get to the
toilet because he can't make it right.
Speaker 2 (12:20):
He's at home and he invites Erin to come and
basically help him, help him. Yeah, because he is that sick.
Speaker 3 (12:27):
Is that sick?
Speaker 2 (12:28):
So this is what Simon Patterson said in pre trial
to Aaron Patterson's lawyer, the barrister Coln Mandy. These are
his words, but it is not his voice.
Speaker 4 (12:39):
I remember calling her before sunrise. It felt very early,
let's put it that way. I recall telling her that
I'd been having trouble getting myself to the toilet. I
asked her to come over and help me to get
to the toilet.
Speaker 5 (12:53):
She came over straight away, to your recollection.
Speaker 4 (12:57):
It didn't feel like that. It was a long time.
Speaker 5 (12:59):
When she got to your house, she called Triple zero.
Speaker 4 (13:03):
All I really remember is she came into the bedroom.
I saw her come in. We exchanged a greeting. I
was sitting on the end of the bed. I lay
back on the bed, and that's the last thing I remember.
Speaker 5 (13:14):
Did you hear her on the phone to Triple zero. No,
Apart from her coming into the room and exchanging some
kind of greeting, that's where your memory ends. What's the
next thing you recall.
Speaker 4 (13:25):
I can recall being on a trolley in the hospital
and Aaron trying to attract attention of a medical staff
and that person rushing off.
Speaker 2 (13:32):
So as Aaron enters the house, she's found Simon quite ill,
and she calls Triple zero.
Speaker 3 (13:41):
Yeah, and Simon says, as you heard just then, he
can recall that she's come into the bedroom and he's
passed out. So from then on, what we understand from
his evidence in court is that he's unconscious when he
goes to the hospital, and when he's there he has
repeated life saving surgeries, including one major surgery to remove
a lie large section of his bow, all of which
(14:02):
because Aaron is his next of kin, the doctors have
had to contact Eron and ask her permission to perform
these life saving operations. And she's given that permission, and
then Simon's had the surgeries and he's spent then a
very long time recuperating from this life saving surgery.
Speaker 2 (14:21):
Okay, this has gone well past gastro suspicions. At this point.
He's having multiple surgeries to save his life. YEA, is
he suspicious? If he was suspicious the first time, he's
got to be very suspicious now.
Speaker 3 (14:36):
He says, the first time across his mind, and he
made a joke. But he doesn't say after this illness
that it crossed his mind again. It didn't come up
again because after this illness, after he spends a lengthy
amount of time in hospital, he's discharged to Aaron's home.
He's still quite unwell. When he's discharged from hospital. He
says that he can't walk up the stairs and he
(14:57):
can't drive. So Aaron invites him to come and move
into the Langatha home with her and the kids so
that she can help care for him, and he moves
into a bedroom underneath her bedroom on a multi level house,
and within weeks he says that he starts to feel stronger,
he can drive again, he can walk upstairs again. But
(15:17):
then he falls sick again.
Speaker 2 (15:19):
So we're in July twenty twenty two, and we're now
moving to a part of the story which we call
a special stew, a special stew. What's this special stew ash?
Speaker 3 (15:33):
It's a beef stew and it's special because Simon says
that Aaron makes him this special stew for lunch one day,
just for him, and he calls it an unusual activity
that she would make this lunch for him specially. So
what he says in court is that she had specially
made some stew for me to have.
Speaker 2 (15:54):
So I appreciated that, okay, And within five hours he's
sick again.
Speaker 3 (16:01):
He's sick again, feeling nauseous, yeah, starts to feel nauseous.
Speaker 2 (16:05):
Vomiting yep, diarrhea yep. Okay. So he's experienced all this before, okay,
and now it's happening again.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
It's happening again, and so what he does is it's
happening in the evening and when he's in his own bedroom,
and he says that he grabs his phone. He calls Eron,
who's in the bedroom above, and they have a conversation
about what to do because the kids are at home.
They're in bed, so she can't drive him off to
hospital because we can't leave the kids by themselves. So
they decide to call Don and Gaiale, his parents, Don
(16:37):
and Gal Patterson, and ask them to come and pick
him up and take him to hospital.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
So we are in July of twenty twenty two when
this special stew is made for him and he eats it. Yep, okay,
so we're quite laid in the piece for about a
year before the lunch.
Speaker 3 (16:52):
Yeah it is. It's almost would be fatal, almost exactly.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
Yeah, yeah, okay. So Simon's parents taking the hospital. He's
obviously discharged and he returns to Aaron's house for two weeks.
Speaker 3 (17:05):
He goes to hospital. He's on a drip. And I'll
point out this is an illness that Aaron Patterson was
never charged over, so it mustn't have been as serious
as other illnesses that Simon Patterson suffered. And they believed,
or they'd accused Aaron of attempting to murder him. So
he comes back to Aaron Patterson's house for about two weeks,
(17:28):
and after that two weeks, he says, he started to
realize he didn't think that Aaron wanted him there.
Speaker 2 (17:37):
They start to fight and she becomes irritated with him.
Speaker 3 (17:41):
Is that right? Yeah, she does well. Simon says that
she basically goes on this tirade. She comes into his
bedroom and she's frustrated with him, and among the things
that he says that she tells him is that she's
upset him. He spends too much time in bed, he
(18:03):
hasn't been helping around the house. He'd only get up
to make his own food, which at that stage, he
said he'd often get up and make himself a ham,
cheese and tomato toasted sandwich. He said this was not
her word that she used, but it was about the
spirit of it, but that he'd been a bit dictatorial
with asking her to bring his phone charge.
Speaker 2 (18:22):
Out that she says he's ordering her.
Speaker 3 (18:24):
Yeah, he's in hospital and he says, can you bring
me my phone? Yeah, and she has to bring it
to the hospital. This is what he says to the court.
He says he paused for quite a long time, he says,
I wasn't sure how to respond, and then I said
to her, I'm sorry to hear you feel that way,
and then she stormed out.
Speaker 2 (18:42):
Okay, and does he feel like he's somewhat captive to her?
Speaker 3 (18:50):
Or well, the thing is here, he leaves, he leaves,
So in.
Speaker 2 (18:55):
The end, I mean, it might be a stupid question,
but what did he decide to leave?
Speaker 3 (19:01):
Well, he said that at that point it was clear
to him that it wasn't wise for him to keep
staying there. And he also agreed with Aaron Patterson's defense lawyer,
Colin Mandy, that he was there in the hope that
they would reunite, that they'd get back together, but after
this situation that hope had diminished.
Speaker 2 (19:23):
So that had been a common theme right up to
this point. He was always trying to reconcile.
Speaker 3 (19:28):
Thinking in the back of his mind that they would
get back together. But at this point, he said, he
thought it was done.
Speaker 2 (19:36):
And yet there is a third trip.
Speaker 3 (19:39):
Yeah, there is there is a third trip. Simon said
that after the issues on the first two camping trips,
Aaron again suggests another camping trip, this time in September
twenty twenty two, and they would go again to Wilson's prom.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
Who brought the food this time? Aaron brought the food again.
Speaker 3 (19:58):
Every time she's brought the food, and this was a
point in court. Colin Mandy asked, were you involved in
preparing the food? Did you bring the food? And he
said no, Aaron was bringing food.
Speaker 2 (20:09):
So let me get this straight. He has, for one
of a better word, escaped the house. He thinks it's over.
Speaker 3 (20:20):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (20:20):
She suggests a third trip, another trip, but before this
she had been giving him the cold shoulder as well.
Speaker 3 (20:28):
Yeah, he said that. After the tirade for one of
a better word, and in his bedroom when she came
in and had to go at all the things that
he wasn't doing, he said that she was cold shouldered
towards him. And he moved out, and he moved into
his parents' place. He was recuperating at his parents place
for a little while.
Speaker 2 (20:46):
And then he goes to Wilson's Prom with her again.
Speaker 3 (20:50):
In September twenty twenty two.
Speaker 2 (20:52):
And Aaron's bringing the food.
Speaker 3 (20:54):
Aaron's bringing the food.
Speaker 2 (20:56):
Okay, So they sat at a picnic table in the
title where Eron's handed him a vegetable curry rap in
aliminium foil.
Speaker 3 (21:06):
Yeah, So he said, they're sitting at the picnic table
and she brings him a rap, hands it to him.
It's in aluminum foil. And said that she had the
same ingredients that was in his rap, but not in
a rap. So she had the stuff that was inside,
but she didn't have it wrapped.
Speaker 2 (21:23):
Up in a rap, So hers isn't in an aliminum foil.
Speaker 3 (21:26):
No, he didn't describe how hers was prepared, But to
my mind, it made me think that she's got a
container that has vegetables and curry. She's just eating it
out of container, whereas he has these things contained in
a rap.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
And how's he feeling at this point.
Speaker 3 (21:42):
Well, okay, when he eats the rap. And then they
finished their lunch, they pack up everything, and they decided
to go on a short walk on the beach. And
he said that he felt a little bit unwell, but
he felt he things weren't quite right.
Speaker 2 (21:55):
But that's is this a romantic walk on the beach
like at Wilson's Price.
Speaker 3 (22:00):
It's not how he described it.
Speaker 5 (22:02):
Right.
Speaker 3 (22:03):
Things that are happening at the same time. He's an
avid photographer. He's taking photos of birds, they saw a snake. Yep,
they're going to see a waterfall, right, so nature lovers
are supposed to the romance have to come in to play.
Speaker 2 (22:16):
Well, they're previously married, so and he's always trying to reconcile,
so and they're alone.
Speaker 3 (22:21):
But he did say that only a couple months later
he felt that that hope was diminished.
Speaker 2 (22:26):
So maybe, so let's get back to what happens to
him on this trip. He goes into spasms, Yeah, he does.
Speaker 3 (22:37):
He says that he starts fitting and that's actually at
his parents house. So he becomes unwell on this walk
and he says he's not feeling good. So they decide
to cut their trip short and instead of continuing on,
they drive to his parents, Don and Gale's house. And
he said when they get there at the car, he's
greeted by his parents and his son and he says, Tom,
(23:00):
I need a bed and a bucket. I'm not feeling
very well. And how he remembers it, he's leaning on
his son to get him help to get to the bedroom.
And when he's there, the decision is made to make
a call to the ambulance to get paramedics to come
and get him as should.
Speaker 2 (23:16):
This time, he starts slurring his words.
Speaker 3 (23:18):
Yeah. First off, he says that his body starts to
go into convulsions, he starts fitting, and when the paramedics arrive,
he said he's strong enough to get himself onto the trolley,
but then when he's in the ambulance, he starts to
lose more and more muscle function. And he said that
by the end of the trip, all he could move
was his neck, his tongue, and his lips, so the
(23:39):
rest of his body he lost control over.
Speaker 2 (23:41):
So at this point, there hasn't been a diagnosis of
poisoning at this.
Speaker 3 (23:47):
Age for none of them. For all of his illnesses,
he says he's either assumed that he had gastro and
he didn't get any affirmation from any doctors. He wasn't
told that he didn't have that, but he's never given
an actual diagnosis. They can't work out what is wrong
with him. And he said that doctors have tried and
tested him for many things and they can't work out
(24:11):
what's making him sick. So they're treating his symptoms, but
they can't work out what's causing them.
Speaker 2 (24:17):
But ultimately an expert will come along and say this
illness was consistent with rat poisoning.
Speaker 3 (24:23):
Yeah. So this is another section of the court saga
that happened before the trial that the community has not
heard so far. The prosecution team went to the Court
of Appeal and you'll hear all that, I believe in
another episode that we do about what the jury didn't hear.
They went to the Court of Appeal and they were
(24:44):
trying to get Simon's charges brought back into the murder
trump and there was a few other issues with evidence
that was removed, and the prosecution said to the Court
of Appeal judges panel that they had an expert who
would say that this illness was consistent with rat poison.
Speaker 2 (25:03):
Okay, so post the charges of triple murder, they've looked
more deeply into these ledged poisonings of Simon Patterson, and
in this third trip they have some sort of expert
analysis which suggests this could be rat poisoning. This last
trip to Wilson's prom has the elements of rat poisoning.
Speaker 3 (25:25):
That's what they said.
Speaker 2 (25:26):
Yeah, all right, so after this third trip, which occurs
in September of twenty twenty two, he is pretty sus
by then.
Speaker 3 (25:36):
Yeah, oh yeah, sas, Yeah, his thinking starts to change,
but he confides in family and we'll get to what
family members he told when what they said to him.
But he's not convinced. He's dissuaded basically that this could
be a deliberate poisoning. Even though he thinks it might
(25:58):
be the case, he's dissuaded by his family members, and
he said it's not until his cousin Tim Patterson comes
to him of his own accord and says to him,
I think that Aaron might be poisoning you because every
time you've been sick, you've been eating food with her,
food that she's prepared. And he said that was the
turning point when his cousin Tim said to him, I
(26:18):
think Aaron might be poisoning him.
Speaker 2 (26:21):
And he's also seen a GP a doctor who has
suggested to him to make a spreadsheet.
Speaker 3 (26:28):
Yeah. So a witness that the jury never heard from
is a man by the name of doctor Chris Ford.
Speaker 2 (26:35):
And doctor Ford was a Carnboro Baptist church member, so
they went to church together.
Speaker 3 (26:39):
They went to church together that they were friends, yep,
and they also did Bible study together.
Speaker 2 (26:45):
Okay, so Simon makes a spreadsheet. How does it help him?
Speaker 3 (26:49):
So they're trying to work out, after his fourth illness,
what's going on here, what's causing these illnesses? So doctor
Ford says, why don't you make a spreadsheet of all
the things that you did and all the things that
he ate before you became sick. So Simon's and his
parents placed on in Gaale where he's staying to recuperate,
and he starts to put together this spreadsheet.
Speaker 2 (27:10):
And here we have voice actors re enacting the conversation
he had about that spreadsheet with Prosecutor Jane Warren.
Speaker 6 (27:18):
You ask questions today by mister Mandy about the spreadsheet
you prepared to try and find any common denominators in
your illnesses? Did you identify any?
Speaker 4 (27:28):
I was aware Aaron had prepared the food I'd eat
and shortly before each illness, being with Arin Pryor, and
also being about in nature or just about to that's
probably a bit more alternative the first one. We weren't
in nature yet. I noticed that.
Speaker 6 (27:44):
When you went through that process, What if any impact
did that have on your suspicion in relation to Aaron
poisoning you?
Speaker 4 (27:52):
When I made the spreadsheet and what I came up
with was my thought, this could appear to be someone
else looking at this, that Aaron was the ash.
Speaker 2 (28:01):
You've just brought up this turning point, and it comes
when he talks to his cousin, Tim Patterson, and he's
raises his suspicions with Simon that Eron may be poisoning him.
So it's Tim that's telling Simon what he already what.
Speaker 3 (28:22):
He suspects, what Simon has in the back of his head.
Tim comes to him and affirms that for him, and
after his cousin Tim says this, he starts taking it
more seriously. He says that he respects his cousin Tim,
and when Tim says something, take it seriously, okay.
Speaker 2 (28:40):
And this coincides correct me if I'm wrong with another
pivotal point in Aaron Patterson and Simon Patterson's relationship, where
Eron finds a tax return in which Simon says that
he's separated from her the first time. For the first time,
he's making it publicly official in a government record that
(29:02):
they're separated, which has some financial implications for her.
Speaker 3 (29:06):
So lots of things are happening at this time.
Speaker 2 (29:09):
So it's it's cooling between them.
Speaker 3 (29:11):
It's cooling yeah. Yeah, So he notices that their relationship
that used to be quite chatty has called off. And
it's after they have this dispute about his tax return
where she's noticed that he's listed himself as single, which
means that they have all these repercussions with how they
organize the finances.
Speaker 2 (29:30):
And tax implications and things like that. And we start
to move pretty rapidly at this point because in November
of twenty twenty two, so just a few months later,
we're in the same period time, Simon's at his parents'
house and he's a chat to Don, his father. What's
(29:51):
that all about?
Speaker 3 (29:53):
Simon recalls having a chat with his father at his parents' house.
His mom, Gail's father is Don Don Patterson, who dies
from the mushroom lunch. He recalls his mother's not there,
and he has a chat with his father in November
twenty twenty two and says to his dad that he
thinks that Aaron has been deliberately poisoning his food.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
So, in November of twenty twenty two, Don is told
of this suspicion of food poisoning.
Speaker 3 (30:22):
Yeah, and he has an interesting response, what's that? Simon
says his father was very thoughtful and then he said
to him, I suggest you don't tell too many people
about that, okay.
Speaker 2 (30:35):
And Simon also confides in his brother Matt.
Speaker 3 (30:38):
He does there at a gig in Saint Kilda at
the Palais Theater Ben Harper Concert. It's in February twenty
twenty three, right, and he said that he talked to
his brother about his suspicions. And his brother also gave
evidence in pre trial hearings about this conversation, and he
said that he assumed that Simon's nervousness in catching up
(31:01):
with Aaron might have been the cause of his problems,
his illnesses. So it was his nervousness that caused these
issues for his health.
Speaker 2 (31:10):
And at about the same time, Simon's concerns persist and
he tells doctor Chris Ford. What's he tell him?
Speaker 3 (31:20):
Doctor Chris Ford is his friend and.
Speaker 2 (31:21):
He's jap one from Cabarra.
Speaker 3 (31:23):
That's the one from Cambra, from Carambra, a Baptist. He's
the one that's told him to put together this spreadsheet, yes,
of things that are making him sick. So he says
that he has a consultation with doctor Ford in February
twenty twenty three, I think he's the twenty first of
feb and tells him about his poisoning suspicions. Doctor Ford's
(31:43):
evidence on this, he gave evidence in pretrial to his
evidence was that Simon had told him that Aaron and
their daughter had made him some cookies and given him
these cookies.
Speaker 2 (31:56):
And so Simon receives cookies from his daughter.
Speaker 3 (32:00):
Yeah, he's told that Aaron and the daughter have made
them together, and Aaron gets in contact with him and
asks him if he's eaten the cookies, and he says
that she's quite persistent.
Speaker 2 (32:11):
So she's encouraging him again.
Speaker 3 (32:12):
Yeah. Doctor Ford says that Simon told him Aaron called
several times asking him whether he'd eaten any of the cookies,
and Simon thought it was odd that she'd be so
focused on eating the cookies. And in the end he
took a nibble and then he threw the rest out
because he was concerned that they might have been poisoned.
Speaker 2 (32:29):
Does he Quizer about it, does Simon Quizzy's wife?
Speaker 3 (32:32):
No, he doesn't, but he does start doing some research
on the internet about what poisons could go in cookies,
and then works out that he can't test for these
things himself, so doesn't bother with that, but he starts
looking into it.
Speaker 2 (32:45):
I assume he's so worried that this is the point
in time when he changes his power of attorney.
Speaker 3 (32:51):
Yeah, so this consultation, it goes for about fifty minutes,
it's pretty long. And after this consult doctor Ford said,
Simon decide to change his medical power of attorney to
remove Erin as the decision maker when he has a
life and death experience and to put someone else in place.
Speaker 2 (33:09):
And that's Donnie's father.
Speaker 3 (33:11):
Yeah, it's don who he's confided in about his poisoning
suspicions four months earlier. And he also has a second
medical power of attorney and that's his brother Matt.
Speaker 2 (33:20):
And this is five months before the fatal lunch in
July twenty twenty three.
Speaker 3 (33:25):
Yeah, so I think it's almost on the same day
as the conversation with doctor Ford. At the consultation, he
gets his dad don to sign on a legal document
to sign on as his medical power of attorney.
Speaker 2 (33:36):
So from here on in for Simon, Eron's food is out.
Speaker 3 (33:41):
Simon does not eat another one of Aaron Patterson's meals
after that point. Aaron's food is no longer on the menu.
Simon was asked by Colin Mandy, Aeron's defense lawyer, what
his father's reaction was when he told him of his
poisoning suspicions. This is their interaction.
Speaker 5 (33:56):
You said you had told Don about your suspicions previously.
Speaker 4 (33:59):
Do you remember I think I told him about November.
Speaker 5 (34:03):
Do you remember that conversation where it was It was
it mum and Dad's house? Was your mom present?
Speaker 7 (34:09):
No?
Speaker 5 (34:10):
Just you and your father?
Speaker 4 (34:12):
Yes?
Speaker 5 (34:13):
What was his reaction?
Speaker 4 (34:15):
He was very thoughtful, Can I have some tissues? And
he said, I suggest you don't tell too many people
about that.
Speaker 5 (34:23):
Did he tell you why that was his advice?
Speaker 3 (34:25):
No?
Speaker 5 (34:26):
Did you understand why that was his advice?
Speaker 4 (34:29):
I thought I had a reasonable sense of why I
said that, probably because that could create issues in the
way people relate, especially probably with Aaron and our family.
Speaker 5 (34:39):
Ash.
Speaker 2 (34:40):
We will get to the fatal lunch very shortly, But
what our listeners may not know is that Aaron Pattison
invited her estranged husband Simon to a lunch about a
month prior to that. This is a lunch in the
sort of June July of twenty three.
Speaker 3 (34:59):
This is a about a month before the deadly lunch. Okay,
Aaron Patterson invites her estranger in laws John and Gail
to Emil with her kids, and she also invites Simon and.
Speaker 2 (35:11):
To give a reason for the lunch given the state
of affairs.
Speaker 3 (35:14):
Simon doesn't remember there ever being a reason, just to
have lunch, catch up, catch up. But he refused that invitation,
and he was asked in court by the prosecution why
he refused, and this is what he said.
Speaker 4 (35:27):
I thought there would be a risk she would poison
me if I attended.
Speaker 2 (35:31):
So Simon's position is firm. He is very suspicious are
erin and believes that he is being poisoned by her.
Speaker 3 (35:39):
He thinks she's repeatedly tried to kill him.
Speaker 2 (35:41):
Yeah, and yet there is another invitation for a lunch
on July twenty nine, twenty twenty three, that is offered
to his parents, Done Gale, to his uncle and art
Ian and Heather Wilkinson, and to him.
Speaker 3 (36:00):
So this happens at church at Crumborough Baptist Church. Simon
recalled Aaron came up to him after the church service
and invited him to this what we're now calling the
lethal lunch, the Lethal Mushroom lunch. He was with doctor
Chris Ford, and doctor Ford also gave pre trial evidence
about this, saying he saw Aaron walk up to them.
(36:23):
Doctor Ford is also their daughter's general practitioner, was at
that stage. Aaron confirmed an appointment with doctor Ford and
then turned to Simon and said, I'm hosting this lunch.
Would you like to come? And his reply, according to
doctor Ford, was thank you. And she walked away, and
doctor Ford said after she walked away, Simon turned to
(36:45):
him and said, I'll be politely declining.
Speaker 2 (36:49):
Okay, but his parents have been invited and he's I'm
Glen Art. Now Don knows. Don Patterson knows by then,
He's known for months that his son is suspicious, that
he's been poisoned.
Speaker 3 (37:10):
And Don does not tell his wife, Gail.
Speaker 2 (37:13):
And he doesn't tell Ian and Heather No, who don't
know Eron all.
Speaker 3 (37:19):
That well, they don't know. Three of the lunch guests
do not know about Simon's suspicions. The only person who
does is Don Patterson, who eats his entire meal and
his wife's leftovers of that fateful meal.
Speaker 2 (37:34):
They all drive together to this lunch. Don and Gail
pick up Ian and Heather and they all drive together
in a car, and it's not even mentioned.
Speaker 3 (37:43):
We heard evidence from Ian, it didn't come up from
what he said in pre trial hearings. It was not raised.
The first time Ian said he heard about poisoning suspicions
was the day that he was sick. After the lunch,
he and his wife and Simon on their door and
urged them to go to hospital. They believe they just
(38:03):
had gastro urged them to go to hospital, saying, Simon saying,
I believe that she's tried to poison me. You need
to go to hospital.
Speaker 2 (38:11):
And this is sparked conversation which the jury heard, which
was about the plates, the plates.
Speaker 3 (38:18):
Heather Her response to Simon saying, I think she's tried
to poison me. You have to go to hospital. Heather's
response was, I noticed the plates, the plates she ate
off a different plate.
Speaker 2 (38:30):
Okay, So that just hasn't come out of nowhere. That's
because Simon.
Speaker 3 (38:35):
Has made this claim yet prompted.
Speaker 2 (38:38):
This conversation that they might have been poisoned.
Speaker 3 (38:41):
Basically yep, and he's so worried he thinks that they
must go to hospital, and he drives them himself to hospital, but.
Speaker 2 (38:48):
Of course he won't know what kind of poisoning.
Speaker 3 (38:51):
Well, they don't know what kind of issues has caused
him to be sick either.
Speaker 2 (38:56):
Now we're in a scenario where Simon will be high
and by all of this sickness, because he'll have a
deep suspicion about what is going on. He takes his
uncle and aunt from their home to Lee and gath
the hospital, and he also goes and visits his parents
(39:16):
who are in corn Borough Hospital. And Don will have
obviously knowledge of what his son has told him. So Don,
what does Don do?
Speaker 3 (39:26):
Don, according to what the court heard, collects his own
vomit in ajar and takes it to the hospital. So
Simon gave evidence saying that after he learned that his
loved ones were sick, he called doctor Ford, who had
said to him if Simon ever became ill again that
they would make sure they did toxicology testing.
Speaker 2 (39:45):
This is his mate, doctor Ford.
Speaker 3 (39:46):
This is his mate who's helped him with the spreadsheet,
who he's told about these cookies, and.
Speaker 2 (39:52):
So he knows he's got a suspicion as well.
Speaker 3 (39:54):
Doctor Ford's also helped him change his medical power of
attorney to Don yep. So after Simon tells doctor Ford
about what's happened after this lunch, everyone's sick. Doctor Ford
races over to caren Borough Hospital where Don and Gaie
are and he says that he sees Don and has
this conversation with him, and Don is holding a jar
of his own vomit and Don says to him, what
(40:17):
do I do with this jar? I've got this sample?
What should I do with it? Chris? And doctor Ford
said he replied, hold on to it because it could
be useful later. And Doctor Ford told the court that
he presumed that Don had kept that because he thought
that it could be evidence, because he assumed that he'd
been deliberately poisoned.
Speaker 2 (40:37):
So the jigsaw puzzle is now coming together. We've got
four people in hospital, Don, gail Ian and Heather, all
aged sixty six and above. We've got Simon Patterson who's
(40:58):
believes he's been poisoned on moultiple occasions. And Erin where's Erin?
Speaker 3 (41:06):
Erin's at home?
Speaker 2 (41:08):
And what's she doing that day? She is July the.
Speaker 3 (41:12):
Thirtieth, July the thirtieth, two twenty three, she drives her son.
Speaker 2 (41:17):
To a pilot Lesson Yeah, and taiab.
Speaker 3 (41:20):
Yeah, an hour and a half drive away, isn't.
Speaker 2 (41:22):
It And it's canceled.
Speaker 3 (41:23):
Yeah, goes all the way there, finds out it's canceled
and has to drive all the way back.
Speaker 2 (41:27):
That's the one where she has stop at the service station,
goes into the toilet for nine seconds.
Speaker 3 (41:31):
Yeah, nine seconds toilet stop.
Speaker 2 (41:33):
And is erin sick.
Speaker 3 (41:36):
She tells Simon that she's been suffering from diarrhea, and
Simon relays this to doctor Ford, and then doctor Ford
relays this to the doctors that are treating all of
Simon's sick loved ones in hospital. Because the conversation is
is the cook unwell? And doctor Ford says, well, she's
(41:57):
got Apparently it's just mild. Apparently she's sick, but it's.
Speaker 2 (42:01):
Mild, so the cook is only a little unwell, a
little unwell. Simon goes back to Cranborough Hospital.
Speaker 3 (42:10):
He goes to visit his parents and he said that
for the first time, his mother, Gail, learns about his
suspicions that Aaron had been poisoning him.
Speaker 2 (42:18):
What's her reaction?
Speaker 3 (42:19):
He says that his father had raised it and told
him that he'd told.
Speaker 2 (42:22):
His mother about Don tells Gail.
Speaker 3 (42:24):
Don tells Gail that their son believed that Aaron was
the cause of his repeated illnesses.
Speaker 2 (42:30):
And might be the cause of this one, and.
Speaker 3 (42:33):
Gail's response is that she was thinking that it was
probably more likely accidental.
Speaker 2 (42:39):
Now the kids then decide, so the Patterson children, Simon's siblings,
then have a get together.
Speaker 3 (42:47):
Simon's called a meeting.
Speaker 2 (42:49):
Okay, and where's the meeting.
Speaker 3 (42:51):
So by this time, all of the lunch guests except
Aaron are at the Austin hospital getting treatment.
Speaker 2 (42:57):
This is days later.
Speaker 3 (42:58):
Yeah, this is on the third of August.
Speaker 2 (43:01):
Okay, August three, so that's four days, five days after lunch.
Speaker 3 (43:06):
So as the lunch guests are getting sicker and sicker,
there are whispers among the siblings, both of the Wilkinson
siblings and the Patterson siblings about what could have caused
this situation, and there's commentary that Simon believed that he's
been deliberately poisoned by Erin.
Speaker 2 (43:26):
So they have what we could term the chapel meeting.
Speaker 3 (43:29):
The chapel meeting. As the whispers swirl, Simon calls a
meeting of all of the cousins and the siblings and
they meet in the Austin Hospital chapel.
Speaker 2 (43:39):
So they all get together for what has been called
the Chapel meeting.
Speaker 3 (43:44):
Simon calls a meeting of his cousins and his siblings.
I believe it's the day before. Heather and Gail pass
Away and Ruth Deubois, the Wilkinson's daughter, tells a pre
trial hearing that Simon gathers everybody together and says to
them that he'd suspected that his own illnesses had been
(44:07):
a deliberate poisoning. He'd stopped eating Aaron's food, and he
was sorry that he hadn't told the lunch guests, but
he thought that they were safe and that he was
the only person that Aaron was targeting.
Speaker 2 (44:21):
So he believed he was the target and she would
never hurt his family.
Speaker 3 (44:26):
That's what he said to his loved ones. And the
next day, Simon's loved ones walked into Hardelberg.
Speaker 2 (44:31):
Police station and they give a tell all statement.
Speaker 3 (44:35):
They tell the police that they think Aaron has tried
to kill their family.
Speaker 2 (44:39):
And interestingly, as this trial got under way and Simon
Patterson had a bit of a conversation with the judge
while the jury wasn't present, so we can't report this
stuff while the trial's underway, but we can talk about
it now. And he basically told the judge that he
(44:59):
felt this whole awful time, his illnesses, the way the
justice system had treated him, he felt was in a
way unfair.
Speaker 3 (45:10):
Yeah, he said that he did not understand why his
charges were dropped. He said it was seemed bizarre to me,
is what he said. Bizarre that his charges were dropped.
And when he was giving evidence in the triple murder trial,
there was a lot that he couldn't say. He called
it non evidence.
Speaker 2 (45:28):
That is got to be difficult for anyone in his
position to be in the witness box being asked questions,
some open ended questions, and he can't tell them what
he knows.
Speaker 3 (45:40):
Here's Simon's conversation with Justice Christopher Biale.
Speaker 7 (45:44):
Once you've completed giving your evidence, you're free to be
present in court if you wish, or to watch the
live stream of the rest of the case.
Speaker 4 (45:52):
I understand and I appreciate that. Thank you all the
hearings that's led up to this, all the discussions about
the way we got to this point here where I'm
sitting here half thinking about the things I'm not allowed
to talk about and I understand I don't actually understand
why it seems bizarre to me, but it is what
it is, Your honor, Would you be able to make
(46:15):
available after all the legal proceedings are finished, the transcripts
of all those hearings, including the trial, for me to
be able to as I grieve the legal process to
help me deal with that grief over it will take
me years.
Speaker 7 (46:30):
Can I have the opportunity to think about that request?
I certainly don't take a negative view of that request,
but I'd like to consider it before making a final
decision about that.
Speaker 2 (46:40):
Is that all right?
Speaker 4 (46:42):
Thank you, your honor. Yes, for me, it's really important,
So I thank you that you'll consider that. And I
suspect some of the family, especially the ones who are witnesses,
would probably appreciate the same.
Speaker 2 (46:53):
Ash As an observer of our justice system and having
sat through all the hearing, to the pre trial hearing,
the trial, what does this process all say to you?
Speaker 3 (47:05):
I think it says that the jury will be blind
to a lot of things that has been ruled inadmissible.
There is a lot of stuff that the jury will
never know until after they've reached their verdict and those
things could be very important context. They could explain a
lot of things, but they have been ruled by the
(47:27):
judge to be inadmissible, so.
Speaker 2 (47:29):
They go to the jury room not knowing the full story.
Speaker 3 (47:35):
It's a weird facet of our justice system that there's
a lot of information that does not go before the jury,
and in this trial, more than in a lot of
other trials that I've seen, the jury will only hear
what the judge has decided that they can hear, but
they'll be hearing about those missing pieces right now.
Speaker 2 (47:52):
The charges laid against Darren Patterson for poisoning her estranged
husband Simon have been withdrawn and in most cases they
never come back, but there are rare occasions where they
can be refiled.
Speaker 3 (48:08):
So it's likely we'll never hear what happened to Simon
unless he writes a tell or.
Speaker 2 (48:13):
Book, which probably going to be the case.
Speaker 3 (48:16):
It could happen.
Speaker 1 (48:17):
Thanks Dows and Ash Now a bit of housekeeping throughout
the trial. We've had quite a few questions about where
Season one of The Mushroom cook had gone because it
talked to the charges relating to the attempted murder of
Simon and other things not before the jury. We made
the decision to unpublish it before the trial, but now
(48:38):
we can open it up again, So from tomorrow you'll
be able to listen to the entire first season of
The Mushroom Cook wherever you get your podcasts.
One of the first things that Justice Christopher Bill told
the jury in the trial of Aaron Patterson was something
he said they should immediately put out of their minds.
He told them about charges of attempted murder, charges that
Aaron tried to poison her estranged husband, Simon Patterson, charges
(00:20):
the prosecution had dropped. Now we can finally tell you
about them. He is veteran crime reporter Anthony Dowsley with
court reporter ash Argoon. Stick around until the end because
we have some other news about the podcast that we
think you'll like. I'm Brook Greebert Craig, and this is
(00:41):
the Mushroom.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
I'm here with my esteemed colleague Ashley Argoon. And like
any big story and enormous investigation, there is a backstory
and there are things that the jury did not hear
in the King versus Aaron Patterson. During the pre trial
(01:03):
to this trial, you hear a lot of evidence that
doesn't end up coming out in the big show of
the trial. And incredibly, there were charges laid against Aaron
Patterson for not once, twice, three times, and even a
(01:24):
fourth trying to poison her husband, Simon Patterson. Now, why
didn't the jury hear any of.
Speaker 3 (01:35):
This ash well. Firstly, the charges against Simon Patterson were dropped.
That we know about that because the jury was told
that on the first day of the trial. They were
told to take those charges out of their mind. Because
the community knew. Initially when the police charged Aaron Patterson,
they charged her over attempted murder charges against her husband, Simon,
(01:58):
her strange husband, Simon. But before those charges were dropped,
what the community does not know is that Aaron Patterson
was due to face two trials. The judge, Justice Christopher Biale.
He decided to separate her charges out, one on murder
charges with the lunch and one with the attempted murder
(02:19):
chargers with Simon.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
So we were going to have two trials and the
second trial was going to basically the Simon Patterson poisoning chargeseah.
So on the eve of the trial, the charges of
Aaron Patterson trying to poison her husband were dropped.
Speaker 3 (02:37):
That's right. But before that happened, Simon Patterson had already
taken the witness box for two days in pre trial
in October twenty twenty four, and I, along with other journalists,
were sitting a mere two meters away from him while
he gave evidence over two days, telling the court how
he believed his strange wife had tried to kill him
(02:59):
on multi pu occasions when she invited him on solo
camping trips in the remote bushland in Victoria. What is
a pre trial, Well, as the name suggests, it's the
hearings that come before a trial. So in this instance,
witnesses were called to give evidence, and some of these
witnesses we never heard from in the trial, and much
(03:22):
of this evidence was never delivered to the jury.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
So it's almost like a process of elimination.
Speaker 3 (03:28):
Yeah, it's like the first chance that the defense gets
to cross examine a witness before they get to the
big dance.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
So let's go through these alleged attempted poisonings one by one,
case by case. Sure, so we have a roller coaster
relationship they separated, that would gather together back and forth,
back and forth, back and forth, and first trip that
(03:54):
they take together didn't eventuate.
Speaker 3 (03:56):
No, basically not so prefacing this with in twenty nineteen,
Simon Patterson said that his a strange wife had invited
him to go to South Africa, just the two of them.
So this is four years after they were separated. He
said she'd never done that since they had had their children.
So their son at that time was ten, so it
had been ten years since she'd invited him on a
(04:17):
trip just the two of them. Their trip was canceled
because of COVID instead in twenty twenty one when the
restrictions eased.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
So about November of twenty twenty one, the.
Speaker 3 (04:28):
Suggestion was they go camping instead. We know how they
loved going camping. Their relationship began basically over a shared
love of the outdoors.
Speaker 2 (04:36):
So instead of going to South Africa an exotic trip,
they end up in Wilson's Prom. Yeah, exactly, quite a
nice place.
Speaker 3 (04:43):
A bit different South Africa, yep, but nice.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
So they go to Wilson's Prom. They're going to go camping.
It's without the kids. It's almost like a reconciliation. It's
maybe suppose.
Speaker 3 (04:54):
I mean, we've heard a lot about how they were
wanting to have a good relationship for the children and
themselves as well, and Simon certainly said that in pre trial.
He said they wanted to have a good relationship, and
he believed for a long time that they were going
to reconcile until he didn't, but that's for later in
this podcast.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
So Erin whips up a dish. What's the dish?
Speaker 3 (05:17):
It's penne bolonnaise. So the night before they go camping
in November twenty twenty one, they do a lot of packing,
so Simon's at his house. They're in separate homes at
this stage. Simon's at his house and Erin comes over
with a tupperware container of pasta and she says to
Simon that this is the dinner that her and the
(05:37):
kid's going to eat for dinner that night, and she
brought him some. So they spend a long time packing
and she ends up leaving at about six or seven o'clock.
And later that night he was asked did you eat
the penn a bolonnais? And he says, at about nine
or ten o'clock he did because Aaron was in contact
with him through the night and he said he felt
(05:59):
the words he used was encouraged to eat tea and
not leave it too late. Encouraged. So he ate that
dinner at nine or ten o'clock and then went to
bed for an early start the next morning head to
Aaron's place.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
So does he become sick during the night.
Speaker 3 (06:17):
No, he starts feeling unwell when he arrives at her home,
and he said when he turned up at the front door,
he was greeted by Aaron and his sister Tanya, who
was there to look after their children while they're away.
And he can't remember who of them had said this,
but they asked if he was okay and commented that
he looked gray.
Speaker 2 (06:39):
Okay, so he's not looking the best. But do they
end up going camping?
Speaker 3 (06:44):
Yeah, he said at that stage, he thought he was
just feeling stressed about the idea that he and Aaron
were going to spend some time alone for the first
time in a long time.
Speaker 2 (06:54):
And they've got an airbnb as well.
Speaker 3 (06:56):
Well, I think they book that on the way when
he starts to become ill, right, So at Aaron's house
before they even leave, he vomits a few times in
the toilet. He's quite unwell, and he decides, well, it's
probably just gastro or something. So they decide to push on.
So they get in the car and drive to Wilson's.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
Prom okay, And do they make it?
Speaker 3 (07:18):
No, No, they don't because he's increasingly unwell. They had
to stop the car. I think once for him to
be sick, and in the end, I believe Aaron booked
an airbanba for them because he was so unwell near
Wilson's prom and they spend about forty eight hours at
that airbanb where Simon's throwing up the whole time, and
(07:39):
eventually he says that they do go to hospital, but
there's a bit of a conversation first. It takes a
little while for them to decide to get to hospital.
Speaker 2 (07:48):
So it basically says, I'm pretty sick, I need to
go to hospital.
Speaker 3 (07:51):
He said he had mentioned to his wife he thought
that he needed to go to hospital, and her comment was,
hospitals in our part of the world are a bit
hard to get into. Sometimes sometimes there's a bit of
a weight, so it might be better to just wait
and see and see if the symptoms a bait.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
So he probably thought he had a gastro bug or
something like that. Yeah, he go to hospital.
Speaker 3 (08:15):
In the end, Yeah, yeah, he goes to hospital. Aaron
takes him to hospital and he's in there for a week,
in and out of hospital for about a week, and
he thinks that he has gastro and he says the
doctors can't tell him exactly what's gone on, but he
believes he has gastro and after about a week and
being on a trip, he goes back home to his
own home.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
So oddly enough, Simon comes around to the idea that
he's a little bit suspicious of this sickness that he's had.
We're into the next year, or into twenty twenty two
by this time, and he kind of ribs her about it.
Speaker 3 (08:50):
He does in the new year. He said that it
briefly crosses his mind that maybe Aaron might have poisoned him.
And when she invites him to a makeup trip camping trip,
because as we know, they barely made it to the
first one. They made it to Airbnb outside of Wilson's
prom but they didn't actually go camping, so he says,
she suggests that they go on a makeup trip, this
(09:13):
time to haw Qua outside of Mansfield in May twenty two,
and he said before they went he had a bit
of a joke with her and said to her that
she might put something in the food and poison me.
Speaker 2 (09:24):
But he gets sick again, doesn't he.
Speaker 3 (09:26):
They go away to hau Qua and the preamble for
this dinner that they have in hau Qua that he
believes causes him to be sick. Is that about a
week before they go on their trip, he goes over
to Aaron's place, as he said, he did quite a bit,
and she's running a taste test of spice with the kids,
with the kids and Simon, and she's getting them to
(09:47):
taste different sauces and she says it's because she's making
a curry and she wants to check everyone's spice level
to see how spicy they can handle their food. So
a week later, when they're camping, it's the second night
that they're away in hal Kwa, and he says he's
served up this chicken corma curry and he believes this
is the curry that's specially made to his spice level
(10:10):
from the test.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
The week before. Yeah, okay, So he eats the chicken corma, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (10:15):
Chicken comra and rice. Right, they eat the chicken comra
and rice, and he.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
Believes they eat the same eat the same meal.
Speaker 3 (10:21):
Well, he says that he can see that she's eating
a meal that he believes is the same meal, but
he didn't see how it was prepared or what tuppleware
containers it was packaged in if it was separate or whatever.
He's served up the food, he eats it, and at
about midnight he starts to feel sick.
Speaker 2 (10:39):
So Simon probably has a hot flush.
Speaker 3 (10:43):
He says, he feels hot. He starts feeling hot, especially
in the head.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
Right And when he's describing this, how did he describe
how he felt?
Speaker 3 (10:53):
He said it was about midnight he felt hot, especially
in the head, and he said it led to him
feeling washes and then quite suddenly he needed to vomit.
And then after the vomiting, he started to have diarrhea.
Speaker 2 (11:06):
Okay, so that sounds like food poisoning. Does he go
to hospital again?
Speaker 3 (11:11):
Well, it's nighttime. They're out camping, so they wait until
the sun comes up, and Simon says, you know, hospital time.
So they agree to go to Mansfield Hospital, and he
says that their campsite. Aaron packs up the entire thing.
The only thing that she can't do is lift the
(11:31):
tent into the back of the car, so he has
to help with that, and they head to Mansfield Hospital
where he's there. He stops vomiting that afternoon and he's
discharge the next day.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
So Aaron drives him back to Curramborough the next day. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (11:47):
Yeah, So they head back in the car. Aaron drives
him to his own house and he spends a couple
of days there. I think this is the Friday, and
he's at home by himself for a couple of days
and then something happens on the Sunday. What happens on
the Sunday, Well, he wakes up he is so unwell
and it needs to go to the toilet, but he
(12:08):
can't get himself there. So he says, around about sunrise,
he calls up Eron and asks if she can come
over to his house to help him get to the
toilet because he can't make it right.
Speaker 2 (12:20):
He's at home and he invites Erin to come and
basically help him, help him. Yeah, because he is that sick.
Speaker 3 (12:27):
Is that sick?
Speaker 2 (12:28):
So this is what Simon Patterson said in pre trial
to Aaron Patterson's lawyer, the barrister Coln Mandy. These are
his words, but it is not his voice.
Speaker 4 (12:39):
I remember calling her before sunrise. It felt very early,
let's put it that way. I recall telling her that
I'd been having trouble getting myself to the toilet. I
asked her to come over and help me to get
to the toilet.
Speaker 5 (12:53):
She came over straight away, to your recollection.
Speaker 4 (12:57):
It didn't feel like that. It was a long time.
Speaker 5 (12:59):
When she got to your house, she called Triple zero.
Speaker 4 (13:03):
All I really remember is she came into the bedroom.
I saw her come in. We exchanged a greeting. I
was sitting on the end of the bed. I lay
back on the bed, and that's the last thing I remember.
Speaker 5 (13:14):
Did you hear her on the phone to Triple zero. No,
Apart from her coming into the room and exchanging some
kind of greeting, that's where your memory ends. What's the
next thing you recall.
Speaker 4 (13:25):
I can recall being on a trolley in the hospital
and Aaron trying to attract attention of a medical staff
and that person rushing off.
Speaker 2 (13:32):
So as Aaron enters the house, she's found Simon quite ill,
and she calls Triple zero.
Speaker 3 (13:41):
Yeah, and Simon says, as you heard just then, he
can recall that she's come into the bedroom and he's
passed out. So from then on, what we understand from
his evidence in court is that he's unconscious when he
goes to the hospital, and when he's there he has
repeated life saving surgeries, including one major surgery to remove
a lie large section of his bow, all of which
(14:02):
because Aaron is his next of kin, the doctors have
had to contact Eron and ask her permission to perform
these life saving operations. And she's given that permission, and
then Simon's had the surgeries and he's spent then a
very long time recuperating from this life saving surgery.
Speaker 2 (14:21):
Okay, this has gone well past gastro suspicions. At this point.
He's having multiple surgeries to save his life. YEA, is
he suspicious? If he was suspicious the first time, he's
got to be very suspicious now.
Speaker 3 (14:36):
He says, the first time across his mind, and he
made a joke. But he doesn't say after this illness
that it crossed his mind again. It didn't come up
again because after this illness, after he spends a lengthy
amount of time in hospital, he's discharged to Aaron's home.
He's still quite unwell. When he's discharged from hospital. He
says that he can't walk up the stairs and he
(14:57):
can't drive. So Aaron invites him to come and move
into the Langatha home with her and the kids so
that she can help care for him, and he moves
into a bedroom underneath her bedroom on a multi level house,
and within weeks he says that he starts to feel stronger,
he can drive again, he can walk upstairs again. But
(15:17):
then he falls sick again.
Speaker 2 (15:19):
So we're in July twenty twenty two, and we're now
moving to a part of the story which we call
a special stew, a special stew. What's this special stew ash?
Speaker 3 (15:33):
It's a beef stew and it's special because Simon says
that Aaron makes him this special stew for lunch one day,
just for him, and he calls it an unusual activity
that she would make this lunch for him specially. So
what he says in court is that she had specially
made some stew for me to have.
Speaker 2 (15:54):
So I appreciated that, okay, And within five hours he's
sick again.
Speaker 3 (16:01):
He's sick again, feeling nauseous, yeah, starts to feel nauseous.
Speaker 2 (16:05):
Vomiting yep, diarrhea yep. Okay. So he's experienced all this before, okay,
and now it's happening again.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
It's happening again, and so what he does is it's
happening in the evening and when he's in his own bedroom,
and he says that he grabs his phone. He calls Eron,
who's in the bedroom above, and they have a conversation
about what to do because the kids are at home.
They're in bed, so she can't drive him off to
hospital because we can't leave the kids by themselves. So
they decide to call Don and Gaiale, his parents, Don
(16:37):
and Gal Patterson, and ask them to come and pick
him up and take him to hospital.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
So we are in July of twenty twenty two when
this special stew is made for him and he eats it. Yep, okay,
so we're quite laid in the piece for about a
year before the lunch.
Speaker 3 (16:52):
Yeah it is. It's almost would be fatal, almost exactly.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
Yeah, yeah, okay. So Simon's parents taking the hospital. He's
obviously discharged and he returns to Aaron's house for two weeks.
Speaker 3 (17:05):
He goes to hospital. He's on a drip. And I'll
point out this is an illness that Aaron Patterson was
never charged over, so it mustn't have been as serious
as other illnesses that Simon Patterson suffered. And they believed,
or they'd accused Aaron of attempting to murder him. So
he comes back to Aaron Patterson's house for about two weeks,
(17:28):
and after that two weeks, he says, he started to
realize he didn't think that Aaron wanted him there.
Speaker 2 (17:37):
They start to fight and she becomes irritated with him.
Speaker 3 (17:41):
Is that right? Yeah, she does well. Simon says that
she basically goes on this tirade. She comes into his
bedroom and she's frustrated with him, and among the things
that he says that she tells him is that she's
upset him. He spends too much time in bed, he
(18:03):
hasn't been helping around the house. He'd only get up
to make his own food, which at that stage, he
said he'd often get up and make himself a ham,
cheese and tomato toasted sandwich. He said this was not
her word that she used, but it was about the
spirit of it, but that he'd been a bit dictatorial
with asking her to bring his phone charge.
Speaker 2 (18:22):
Out that she says he's ordering her.
Speaker 3 (18:24):
Yeah, he's in hospital and he says, can you bring
me my phone? Yeah, and she has to bring it
to the hospital. This is what he says to the court.
He says he paused for quite a long time, he says,
I wasn't sure how to respond, and then I said
to her, I'm sorry to hear you feel that way,
and then she stormed out.
Speaker 2 (18:42):
Okay, and does he feel like he's somewhat captive to her?
Speaker 3 (18:50):
Or well, the thing is here, he leaves, he leaves,
So in.
Speaker 2 (18:55):
The end, I mean, it might be a stupid question,
but what did he decide to leave?
Speaker 3 (19:01):
Well, he said that at that point it was clear
to him that it wasn't wise for him to keep
staying there. And he also agreed with Aaron Patterson's defense lawyer,
Colin Mandy, that he was there in the hope that
they would reunite, that they'd get back together, but after
this situation that hope had diminished.
Speaker 2 (19:23):
So that had been a common theme right up to
this point. He was always trying to reconcile.
Speaker 3 (19:28):
Thinking in the back of his mind that they would
get back together. But at this point, he said, he
thought it was done.
Speaker 2 (19:36):
And yet there is a third trip.
Speaker 3 (19:39):
Yeah, there is there is a third trip. Simon said
that after the issues on the first two camping trips,
Aaron again suggests another camping trip, this time in September
twenty twenty two, and they would go again to Wilson's prom.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
Who brought the food this time? Aaron brought the food again.
Speaker 3 (19:58):
Every time she's brought the food, and this was a
point in court. Colin Mandy asked, were you involved in
preparing the food? Did you bring the food? And he
said no, Aaron was bringing food.
Speaker 2 (20:09):
So let me get this straight. He has, for one
of a better word, escaped the house. He thinks it's over.
Speaker 3 (20:20):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (20:20):
She suggests a third trip, another trip, but before this
she had been giving him the cold shoulder as well.
Speaker 3 (20:28):
Yeah, he said that. After the tirade for one of
a better word, and in his bedroom when she came
in and had to go at all the things that
he wasn't doing, he said that she was cold shouldered
towards him. And he moved out, and he moved into
his parents' place. He was recuperating at his parents place
for a little while.
Speaker 2 (20:46):
And then he goes to Wilson's Prom with her again.
Speaker 3 (20:50):
In September twenty twenty two.
Speaker 2 (20:52):
And Aaron's bringing the food.
Speaker 3 (20:54):
Aaron's bringing the food.
Speaker 2 (20:56):
Okay, So they sat at a picnic table in the
title where Eron's handed him a vegetable curry rap in
aliminium foil.
Speaker 3 (21:06):
Yeah, So he said, they're sitting at the picnic table
and she brings him a rap, hands it to him.
It's in aluminum foil. And said that she had the
same ingredients that was in his rap, but not in
a rap. So she had the stuff that was inside,
but she didn't have it wrapped.
Speaker 2 (21:23):
Up in a rap, So hers isn't in an aliminum foil.
Speaker 3 (21:26):
No, he didn't describe how hers was prepared, But to
my mind, it made me think that she's got a
container that has vegetables and curry. She's just eating it
out of container, whereas he has these things contained in
a rap.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
And how's he feeling at this point.
Speaker 3 (21:42):
Well, okay, when he eats the rap. And then they
finished their lunch, they pack up everything, and they decided
to go on a short walk on the beach. And
he said that he felt a little bit unwell, but
he felt he things weren't quite right.
Speaker 2 (21:55):
But that's is this a romantic walk on the beach
like at Wilson's Price.
Speaker 3 (22:00):
It's not how he described it.
Speaker 5 (22:02):
Right.
Speaker 3 (22:03):
Things that are happening at the same time. He's an
avid photographer. He's taking photos of birds, they saw a snake. Yep,
they're going to see a waterfall, right, so nature lovers
are supposed to the romance have to come in to play.
Speaker 2 (22:16):
Well, they're previously married, so and he's always trying to reconcile,
so and they're alone.
Speaker 3 (22:21):
But he did say that only a couple months later
he felt that that hope was diminished.
Speaker 2 (22:26):
So maybe, so let's get back to what happens to
him on this trip. He goes into spasms, Yeah, he does.
Speaker 3 (22:37):
He says that he starts fitting and that's actually at
his parents house. So he becomes unwell on this walk
and he says he's not feeling good. So they decide
to cut their trip short and instead of continuing on,
they drive to his parents, Don and Gale's house. And
he said when they get there at the car, he's
greeted by his parents and his son and he says, Tom,
(23:00):
I need a bed and a bucket. I'm not feeling
very well. And how he remembers it, he's leaning on
his son to get him help to get to the bedroom.
And when he's there, the decision is made to make
a call to the ambulance to get paramedics to come
and get him as should.
Speaker 2 (23:16):
This time, he starts slurring his words.
Speaker 3 (23:18):
Yeah. First off, he says that his body starts to
go into convulsions, he starts fitting, and when the paramedics arrive,
he said he's strong enough to get himself onto the trolley,
but then when he's in the ambulance, he starts to
lose more and more muscle function. And he said that
by the end of the trip, all he could move
was his neck, his tongue, and his lips, so the
(23:39):
rest of his body he lost control over.
Speaker 2 (23:41):
So at this point, there hasn't been a diagnosis of
poisoning at this.
Speaker 3 (23:47):
Age for none of them. For all of his illnesses,
he says he's either assumed that he had gastro and
he didn't get any affirmation from any doctors. He wasn't
told that he didn't have that, but he's never given
an actual diagnosis. They can't work out what is wrong
with him. And he said that doctors have tried and
tested him for many things and they can't work out
(24:11):
what's making him sick. So they're treating his symptoms, but
they can't work out what's causing them.
Speaker 2 (24:17):
But ultimately an expert will come along and say this
illness was consistent with rat poisoning.
Speaker 3 (24:23):
Yeah. So this is another section of the court saga
that happened before the trial that the community has not
heard so far. The prosecution team went to the Court
of Appeal and you'll hear all that, I believe in
another episode that we do about what the jury didn't hear.
They went to the Court of Appeal and they were
(24:44):
trying to get Simon's charges brought back into the murder
trump and there was a few other issues with evidence
that was removed, and the prosecution said to the Court
of Appeal judges panel that they had an expert who
would say that this illness was consistent with rat poison.
Speaker 2 (25:03):
Okay, so post the charges of triple murder, they've looked
more deeply into these ledged poisonings of Simon Patterson, and
in this third trip they have some sort of expert
analysis which suggests this could be rat poisoning. This last
trip to Wilson's prom has the elements of rat poisoning.
Speaker 3 (25:25):
That's what they said.
Speaker 2 (25:26):
Yeah, all right, so after this third trip, which occurs
in September of twenty twenty two, he is pretty sus
by then.
Speaker 3 (25:36):
Yeah, oh yeah, sas, Yeah, his thinking starts to change,
but he confides in family and we'll get to what
family members he told when what they said to him.
But he's not convinced. He's dissuaded basically that this could
be a deliberate poisoning. Even though he thinks it might
(25:58):
be the case, he's dissuaded by his family members, and
he said it's not until his cousin Tim Patterson comes
to him of his own accord and says to him,
I think that Aaron might be poisoning you because every
time you've been sick, you've been eating food with her,
food that she's prepared. And he said that was the
turning point when his cousin Tim said to him, I
(26:18):
think Aaron might be poisoning him.
Speaker 2 (26:21):
And he's also seen a GP a doctor who has
suggested to him to make a spreadsheet.
Speaker 3 (26:28):
Yeah. So a witness that the jury never heard from
is a man by the name of doctor Chris Ford.
Speaker 2 (26:35):
And doctor Ford was a Carnboro Baptist church member, so
they went to church together.
Speaker 3 (26:39):
They went to church together that they were friends, yep,
and they also did Bible study together.
Speaker 2 (26:45):
Okay, so Simon makes a spreadsheet. How does it help him?
Speaker 3 (26:49):
So they're trying to work out, after his fourth illness,
what's going on here, what's causing these illnesses? So doctor
Ford says, why don't you make a spreadsheet of all
the things that you did and all the things that
he ate before you became sick. So Simon's and his
parents placed on in Gaale where he's staying to recuperate,
and he starts to put together this spreadsheet.
Speaker 2 (27:10):
And here we have voice actors re enacting the conversation
he had about that spreadsheet with Prosecutor Jane Warren.
Speaker 6 (27:18):
You ask questions today by mister Mandy about the spreadsheet
you prepared to try and find any common denominators in
your illnesses? Did you identify any?
Speaker 4 (27:28):
I was aware Aaron had prepared the food I'd eat
and shortly before each illness, being with Arin Pryor, and
also being about in nature or just about to that's
probably a bit more alternative the first one. We weren't
in nature yet. I noticed that.
Speaker 6 (27:44):
When you went through that process, What if any impact
did that have on your suspicion in relation to Aaron
poisoning you?
Speaker 4 (27:52):
When I made the spreadsheet and what I came up
with was my thought, this could appear to be someone
else looking at this, that Aaron was the ash.
Speaker 2 (28:01):
You've just brought up this turning point, and it comes
when he talks to his cousin, Tim Patterson, and he's
raises his suspicions with Simon that Eron may be poisoning him.
So it's Tim that's telling Simon what he already what.
Speaker 3 (28:22):
He suspects, what Simon has in the back of his head.
Tim comes to him and affirms that for him, and
after his cousin Tim says this, he starts taking it
more seriously. He says that he respects his cousin Tim,
and when Tim says something, take it seriously, okay.
Speaker 2 (28:40):
And this coincides correct me if I'm wrong with another
pivotal point in Aaron Patterson and Simon Patterson's relationship, where
Eron finds a tax return in which Simon says that
he's separated from her the first time. For the first time,
he's making it publicly official in a government record that
(29:02):
they're separated, which has some financial implications for her.
Speaker 3 (29:06):
So lots of things are happening at this time.
Speaker 2 (29:09):
So it's it's cooling between them.
Speaker 3 (29:11):
It's cooling yeah. Yeah, So he notices that their relationship
that used to be quite chatty has called off. And
it's after they have this dispute about his tax return
where she's noticed that he's listed himself as single, which
means that they have all these repercussions with how they
organize the finances.
Speaker 2 (29:30):
And tax implications and things like that. And we start
to move pretty rapidly at this point because in November
of twenty twenty two, so just a few months later,
we're in the same period time, Simon's at his parents'
house and he's a chat to Don, his father. What's
(29:51):
that all about?
Speaker 3 (29:53):
Simon recalls having a chat with his father at his parents' house.
His mom, Gail's father is Don Don Patterson, who dies
from the mushroom lunch. He recalls his mother's not there,
and he has a chat with his father in November
twenty twenty two and says to his dad that he
thinks that Aaron has been deliberately poisoning his food.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
So, in November of twenty twenty two, Don is told
of this suspicion of food poisoning.
Speaker 3 (30:22):
Yeah, and he has an interesting response, what's that? Simon
says his father was very thoughtful and then he said
to him, I suggest you don't tell too many people
about that, okay.
Speaker 2 (30:35):
And Simon also confides in his brother Matt.
Speaker 3 (30:38):
He does there at a gig in Saint Kilda at
the Palais Theater Ben Harper Concert. It's in February twenty
twenty three, right, and he said that he talked to
his brother about his suspicions. And his brother also gave
evidence in pre trial hearings about this conversation, and he
said that he assumed that Simon's nervousness in catching up
(31:01):
with Aaron might have been the cause of his problems,
his illnesses. So it was his nervousness that caused these
issues for his health.
Speaker 2 (31:10):
And at about the same time, Simon's concerns persist and
he tells doctor Chris Ford. What's he tell him?
Speaker 3 (31:20):
Doctor Chris Ford is his friend and.
Speaker 2 (31:21):
He's jap one from Cabarra.
Speaker 3 (31:23):
That's the one from Cambra, from Carambra, a Baptist. He's
the one that's told him to put together this spreadsheet, yes,
of things that are making him sick. So he says
that he has a consultation with doctor Ford in February
twenty twenty three, I think he's the twenty first of
feb and tells him about his poisoning suspicions. Doctor Ford's
(31:43):
evidence on this, he gave evidence in pretrial to his
evidence was that Simon had told him that Aaron and
their daughter had made him some cookies and given him
these cookies.
Speaker 2 (31:56):
And so Simon receives cookies from his daughter.
Speaker 3 (32:00):
Yeah, he's told that Aaron and the daughter have made
them together, and Aaron gets in contact with him and
asks him if he's eaten the cookies, and he says
that she's quite persistent.
Speaker 2 (32:11):
So she's encouraging him again.
Speaker 3 (32:12):
Yeah. Doctor Ford says that Simon told him Aaron called
several times asking him whether he'd eaten any of the cookies,
and Simon thought it was odd that she'd be so
focused on eating the cookies. And in the end he
took a nibble and then he threw the rest out
because he was concerned that they might have been poisoned.
Speaker 2 (32:29):
Does he Quizer about it, does Simon Quizzy's wife?
Speaker 3 (32:32):
No, he doesn't, but he does start doing some research
on the internet about what poisons could go in cookies,
and then works out that he can't test for these
things himself, so doesn't bother with that, but he starts
looking into it.
Speaker 2 (32:45):
I assume he's so worried that this is the point
in time when he changes his power of attorney.
Speaker 3 (32:51):
Yeah, so this consultation, it goes for about fifty minutes,
it's pretty long. And after this consult doctor Ford said,
Simon decide to change his medical power of attorney to
remove Erin as the decision maker when he has a
life and death experience and to put someone else in place.
Speaker 2 (33:09):
And that's Donnie's father.
Speaker 3 (33:11):
Yeah, it's don who he's confided in about his poisoning
suspicions four months earlier. And he also has a second
medical power of attorney and that's his brother Matt.
Speaker 2 (33:20):
And this is five months before the fatal lunch in
July twenty twenty three.
Speaker 3 (33:25):
Yeah, so I think it's almost on the same day
as the conversation with doctor Ford. At the consultation, he
gets his dad don to sign on a legal document
to sign on as his medical power of attorney.
Speaker 2 (33:36):
So from here on in for Simon, Eron's food is out.
Speaker 3 (33:41):
Simon does not eat another one of Aaron Patterson's meals
after that point. Aaron's food is no longer on the menu.
Simon was asked by Colin Mandy, Aeron's defense lawyer, what
his father's reaction was when he told him of his
poisoning suspicions. This is their interaction.
Speaker 5 (33:56):
You said you had told Don about your suspicions previously.
Speaker 4 (33:59):
Do you remember I think I told him about November.
Speaker 5 (34:03):
Do you remember that conversation where it was It was
it mum and Dad's house? Was your mom present?
Speaker 7 (34:09):
No?
Speaker 5 (34:10):
Just you and your father?
Speaker 4 (34:12):
Yes?
Speaker 5 (34:13):
What was his reaction?
Speaker 4 (34:15):
He was very thoughtful, Can I have some tissues? And
he said, I suggest you don't tell too many people
about that.
Speaker 5 (34:23):
Did he tell you why that was his advice?
Speaker 3 (34:25):
No?
Speaker 5 (34:26):
Did you understand why that was his advice?
Speaker 4 (34:29):
I thought I had a reasonable sense of why I
said that, probably because that could create issues in the
way people relate, especially probably with Aaron and our family.
Speaker 5 (34:39):
Ash.
Speaker 2 (34:40):
We will get to the fatal lunch very shortly, But
what our listeners may not know is that Aaron Pattison
invited her estranged husband Simon to a lunch about a
month prior to that. This is a lunch in the
sort of June July of twenty three.
Speaker 3 (34:59):
This is a about a month before the deadly lunch. Okay,
Aaron Patterson invites her estranger in laws John and Gail
to Emil with her kids, and she also invites Simon and.
Speaker 2 (35:11):
To give a reason for the lunch given the state
of affairs.
Speaker 3 (35:14):
Simon doesn't remember there ever being a reason, just to
have lunch, catch up, catch up. But he refused that invitation,
and he was asked in court by the prosecution why
he refused, and this is what he said.
Speaker 4 (35:27):
I thought there would be a risk she would poison
me if I attended.
Speaker 2 (35:31):
So Simon's position is firm. He is very suspicious are
erin and believes that he is being poisoned by her.
Speaker 3 (35:39):
He thinks she's repeatedly tried to kill him.
Speaker 2 (35:41):
Yeah, and yet there is another invitation for a lunch
on July twenty nine, twenty twenty three, that is offered
to his parents, Done Gale, to his uncle and art
Ian and Heather Wilkinson, and to him.
Speaker 3 (36:00):
So this happens at church at Crumborough Baptist Church. Simon
recalled Aaron came up to him after the church service
and invited him to this what we're now calling the
lethal lunch, the Lethal Mushroom lunch. He was with doctor
Chris Ford, and doctor Ford also gave pre trial evidence
about this, saying he saw Aaron walk up to them.
(36:23):
Doctor Ford is also their daughter's general practitioner, was at
that stage. Aaron confirmed an appointment with doctor Ford and
then turned to Simon and said, I'm hosting this lunch.
Would you like to come? And his reply, according to
doctor Ford, was thank you. And she walked away, and
doctor Ford said after she walked away, Simon turned to
(36:45):
him and said, I'll be politely declining.
Speaker 2 (36:49):
Okay, but his parents have been invited and he's I'm
Glen Art. Now Don knows. Don Patterson knows by then,
He's known for months that his son is suspicious, that
he's been poisoned.
Speaker 3 (37:10):
And Don does not tell his wife, Gail.
Speaker 2 (37:13):
And he doesn't tell Ian and Heather No, who don't
know Eron all.
Speaker 3 (37:19):
That well, they don't know. Three of the lunch guests
do not know about Simon's suspicions. The only person who
does is Don Patterson, who eats his entire meal and
his wife's leftovers of that fateful meal.
Speaker 2 (37:34):
They all drive together to this lunch. Don and Gail
pick up Ian and Heather and they all drive together
in a car, and it's not even mentioned.
Speaker 3 (37:43):
We heard evidence from Ian, it didn't come up from
what he said in pre trial hearings. It was not raised.
The first time Ian said he heard about poisoning suspicions
was the day that he was sick. After the lunch,
he and his wife and Simon on their door and
urged them to go to hospital. They believe they just
(38:03):
had gastro urged them to go to hospital, saying, Simon saying,
I believe that she's tried to poison me. You need
to go to hospital.
Speaker 2 (38:11):
And this is sparked conversation which the jury heard, which
was about the plates, the plates.
Speaker 3 (38:18):
Heather Her response to Simon saying, I think she's tried
to poison me. You have to go to hospital. Heather's
response was, I noticed the plates, the plates she ate
off a different plate.
Speaker 2 (38:30):
Okay, So that just hasn't come out of nowhere. That's
because Simon.
Speaker 3 (38:35):
Has made this claim yet prompted.
Speaker 2 (38:38):
This conversation that they might have been poisoned.
Speaker 3 (38:41):
Basically yep, and he's so worried he thinks that they
must go to hospital, and he drives them himself to hospital, but.
Speaker 2 (38:48):
Of course he won't know what kind of poisoning.
Speaker 3 (38:51):
Well, they don't know what kind of issues has caused
him to be sick either.
Speaker 2 (38:56):
Now we're in a scenario where Simon will be high
and by all of this sickness, because he'll have a
deep suspicion about what is going on. He takes his
uncle and aunt from their home to Lee and gath
the hospital, and he also goes and visits his parents
(39:16):
who are in corn Borough Hospital. And Don will have
obviously knowledge of what his son has told him. So Don,
what does Don do?
Speaker 3 (39:26):
Don, according to what the court heard, collects his own
vomit in ajar and takes it to the hospital. So
Simon gave evidence saying that after he learned that his
loved ones were sick, he called doctor Ford, who had
said to him if Simon ever became ill again that
they would make sure they did toxicology testing.
Speaker 2 (39:45):
This is his mate, doctor Ford.
Speaker 3 (39:46):
This is his mate who's helped him with the spreadsheet,
who he's told about these cookies, and.
Speaker 2 (39:52):
So he knows he's got a suspicion as well.
Speaker 3 (39:54):
Doctor Ford's also helped him change his medical power of
attorney to Don yep. So after Simon tells doctor Ford
about what's happened after this lunch, everyone's sick. Doctor Ford
races over to caren Borough Hospital where Don and Gaie
are and he says that he sees Don and has
this conversation with him, and Don is holding a jar
of his own vomit and Don says to him, what
(40:17):
do I do with this jar? I've got this sample?
What should I do with it? Chris? And doctor Ford
said he replied, hold on to it because it could
be useful later. And Doctor Ford told the court that
he presumed that Don had kept that because he thought
that it could be evidence, because he assumed that he'd
been deliberately poisoned.
Speaker 2 (40:37):
So the jigsaw puzzle is now coming together. We've got
four people in hospital, Don, gail Ian and Heather, all
aged sixty six and above. We've got Simon Patterson who's
(40:58):
believes he's been poisoned on moultiple occasions. And Erin where's Erin?
Speaker 3 (41:06):
Erin's at home?
Speaker 2 (41:08):
And what's she doing that day? She is July the.
Speaker 3 (41:12):
Thirtieth, July the thirtieth, two twenty three, she drives her son.
Speaker 2 (41:17):
To a pilot Lesson Yeah, and taiab.
Speaker 3 (41:20):
Yeah, an hour and a half drive away, isn't.
Speaker 2 (41:22):
It And it's canceled.
Speaker 3 (41:23):
Yeah, goes all the way there, finds out it's canceled
and has to drive all the way back.
Speaker 2 (41:27):
That's the one where she has stop at the service station,
goes into the toilet for nine seconds.
Speaker 3 (41:31):
Yeah, nine seconds toilet stop.
Speaker 2 (41:33):
And is erin sick.
Speaker 3 (41:36):
She tells Simon that she's been suffering from diarrhea, and
Simon relays this to doctor Ford, and then doctor Ford
relays this to the doctors that are treating all of
Simon's sick loved ones in hospital. Because the conversation is
is the cook unwell? And doctor Ford says, well, she's
(41:57):
got Apparently it's just mild. Apparently she's sick, but it's.
Speaker 2 (42:01):
Mild, so the cook is only a little unwell, a
little unwell. Simon goes back to Cranborough Hospital.
Speaker 3 (42:10):
He goes to visit his parents and he said that
for the first time, his mother, Gail, learns about his
suspicions that Aaron had been poisoning him.
Speaker 2 (42:18):
What's her reaction?
Speaker 3 (42:19):
He says that his father had raised it and told
him that he'd told.
Speaker 2 (42:22):
His mother about Don tells Gail.
Speaker 3 (42:24):
Don tells Gail that their son believed that Aaron was
the cause of his repeated illnesses.
Speaker 2 (42:30):
And might be the cause of this one, and.
Speaker 3 (42:33):
Gail's response is that she was thinking that it was
probably more likely accidental.
Speaker 2 (42:39):
Now the kids then decide, so the Patterson children, Simon's siblings,
then have a get together.
Speaker 3 (42:47):
Simon's called a meeting.
Speaker 2 (42:49):
Okay, and where's the meeting.
Speaker 3 (42:51):
So by this time, all of the lunch guests except
Aaron are at the Austin hospital getting treatment.
Speaker 2 (42:57):
This is days later.
Speaker 3 (42:58):
Yeah, this is on the third of August.
Speaker 2 (43:01):
Okay, August three, so that's four days, five days after lunch.
Speaker 3 (43:06):
So as the lunch guests are getting sicker and sicker,
there are whispers among the siblings, both of the Wilkinson
siblings and the Patterson siblings about what could have caused
this situation, and there's commentary that Simon believed that he's
been deliberately poisoned by Erin.
Speaker 2 (43:26):
So they have what we could term the chapel meeting.
Speaker 3 (43:29):
The chapel meeting. As the whispers swirl, Simon calls a
meeting of all of the cousins and the siblings and
they meet in the Austin Hospital chapel.
Speaker 2 (43:39):
So they all get together for what has been called
the Chapel meeting.
Speaker 3 (43:44):
Simon calls a meeting of his cousins and his siblings.
I believe it's the day before. Heather and Gail pass
Away and Ruth Deubois, the Wilkinson's daughter, tells a pre
trial hearing that Simon gathers everybody together and says to
them that he'd suspected that his own illnesses had been
(44:07):
a deliberate poisoning. He'd stopped eating Aaron's food, and he
was sorry that he hadn't told the lunch guests, but
he thought that they were safe and that he was
the only person that Aaron was targeting.
Speaker 2 (44:21):
So he believed he was the target and she would
never hurt his family.
Speaker 3 (44:26):
That's what he said to his loved ones. And the
next day, Simon's loved ones walked into Hardelberg.
Speaker 2 (44:31):
Police station and they give a tell all statement.
Speaker 3 (44:35):
They tell the police that they think Aaron has tried
to kill their family.
Speaker 2 (44:39):
And interestingly, as this trial got under way and Simon
Patterson had a bit of a conversation with the judge
while the jury wasn't present, so we can't report this
stuff while the trial's underway, but we can talk about
it now. And he basically told the judge that he
(44:59):
felt this whole awful time, his illnesses, the way the
justice system had treated him, he felt was in a
way unfair.
Speaker 3 (45:10):
Yeah, he said that he did not understand why his
charges were dropped. He said it was seemed bizarre to me,
is what he said. Bizarre that his charges were dropped.
And when he was giving evidence in the triple murder trial,
there was a lot that he couldn't say. He called
it non evidence.
Speaker 2 (45:28):
That is got to be difficult for anyone in his
position to be in the witness box being asked questions,
some open ended questions, and he can't tell them what
he knows.
Speaker 3 (45:40):
Here's Simon's conversation with Justice Christopher Biale.
Speaker 7 (45:44):
Once you've completed giving your evidence, you're free to be
present in court if you wish, or to watch the
live stream of the rest of the case.
Speaker 4 (45:52):
I understand and I appreciate that. Thank you all the
hearings that's led up to this, all the discussions about
the way we got to this point here where I'm
sitting here half thinking about the things I'm not allowed
to talk about and I understand I don't actually understand
why it seems bizarre to me, but it is what
it is, Your honor, Would you be able to make
(46:15):
available after all the legal proceedings are finished, the transcripts
of all those hearings, including the trial, for me to
be able to as I grieve the legal process to
help me deal with that grief over it will take
me years.
Speaker 7 (46:30):
Can I have the opportunity to think about that request?
I certainly don't take a negative view of that request,
but I'd like to consider it before making a final
decision about that.
Speaker 2 (46:40):
Is that all right?
Speaker 4 (46:42):
Thank you, your honor. Yes, for me, it's really important,
So I thank you that you'll consider that. And I
suspect some of the family, especially the ones who are witnesses,
would probably appreciate the same.
Speaker 2 (46:53):
Ash As an observer of our justice system and having
sat through all the hearing, to the pre trial hearing,
the trial, what does this process all say to you?
Speaker 3 (47:05):
I think it says that the jury will be blind
to a lot of things that has been ruled inadmissible.
There is a lot of stuff that the jury will
never know until after they've reached their verdict and those
things could be very important context. They could explain a
lot of things, but they have been ruled by the
(47:27):
judge to be inadmissible, so.
Speaker 2 (47:29):
They go to the jury room not knowing the full story.
Speaker 3 (47:35):
It's a weird facet of our justice system that there's
a lot of information that does not go before the jury,
and in this trial, more than in a lot of
other trials that I've seen, the jury will only hear
what the judge has decided that they can hear, but
they'll be hearing about those missing pieces right now.
Speaker 2 (47:52):
The charges laid against Darren Patterson for poisoning her estranged
husband Simon have been withdrawn and in most cases they
never come back, but there are rare occasions where they
can be refiled.
Speaker 3 (48:08):
So it's likely we'll never hear what happened to Simon
unless he writes a tell or.
Speaker 2 (48:13):
Book, which probably going to be the case.
Speaker 3 (48:16):
It could happen.
Speaker 1 (48:17):
Thanks Dows and Ash Now a bit of housekeeping throughout
the trial. We've had quite a few questions about where
Season one of The Mushroom cook had gone because it
talked to the charges relating to the attempted murder of
Simon and other things not before the jury. We made
the decision to unpublish it before the trial, but now
(48:38):
we can open it up again, So from tomorrow you'll
be able to listen to the entire first season of
The Mushroom Cook wherever you get your podcasts.
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