DAY two of the trial of Leongatha woman Erin Patterson, accused of the murders of three family members, and the attempted murder of a fourth following lunch at her home on Saturday, July 29, 2023, was dominated by the opening remarks by Crown Prosecutor Dr Nannette Rogers SC.

Among the allegations made by Dr Rogers in her address to the court are claims that when the accused woman handed out four meals of beef wellington, mashed potatoes and green beans to her guests, they were served on distinctly different plates from the one she put in front of herself.

According to Dr Rogers, the four guests, her in-laws Don and Gail Patterson of Korumburra, Gail’s sister Heather and her husband Ian Wilkinson also of Korumburra, were given their meals on larger, grey-coloured plates whereas the plate she took her own meal from was smaller, lighter in colour and variously described as being tan or orange with a pattern.

Dr Rogers said one of the deceased, Heather Wilkinson, had made a point of discussing the apparent inconsistency with her husband, Ian Wilkinson, the only person to survive the lunch apart from Erin Patterson herself, wondering why she had not used matching dinner plates.

Mrs Wilkinson also raised the issue with her nephew Simon while receiving treatment in hospital for intense gastro-like symptoms, but he acknowledged that his former wife may have been short of matching plates .

Another allegation receiving the focus of attention from Dr Rogers were repeated claims by the accused that she sourced the mushrooms for the meal, including button mushrooms from Woolworths in Leongatha and dried or dehydrated mushrooms from an Asian grocer in either Oakleigh or Mt Waverley, from commercial retailers, that she had not foraged for wild mushrooms herself.

Much of Dr Rogers’ remarks traced the timelines of the illnesses suffered by the four lunch guests, and allegedly to a lesser extent by Erin Patterson herself, from their symptoms at home overnight on Saturday into Sunday morning, to the Leongatha and Korumburra hospitals and to tertiary hospitals in Melbourne.

Dr Rogers continued her remarks after the lunch adjournment, concluding details about the medical treatment given to the four poison victims, noting that doctors ultimately came to the conclusion that the impact of the amatoxins from the deathcap mushrooms, that three of them had ingested, was irreversible, despite the liver transplant operation performed on Don Patterson and they died within a day and a half of each other, on August 4 and 5, from multiple organ failure.

Ian Wilkinson battled illness for a further month and a half and was discharged from hospital on September 22.

Dr Rogers said that Erin Patterson had invited the family members to her home on July 29, the first time that the Wilkinsons had visited her there, on the pretext that she had received a cancer diagnosis in recent weeks and wanted some guidance on how to proceed. She alleged that the accused did not have cancer and had never sort the treatment she had claimed to have received.

Dr Rogers then turned her attention to the evidence allegedly collected by police from the accused's mobile phone and online activity including accessing the iNaturalist website where contributors had posted the location of deathcap mushrooms in the Loch and Outtrim areas, claiming that mobile phone data from cell towers in the area supported the case that Ms Patterson had visited those areas and lingered long enough to take samples.

Dr Rogers spoke about the disposal of a Sunbeam foodlab dehydrator at the Koonwarra Tip, showing the jury a CCTV photo of Ms Patterson visiting the tip in her distinctive red MG SUV, and other suspicious behaviour by the accused in the days following the lunch, the hospitalisation and ultimately the death of her in-laws, Don and Gail Patterson and Gail's sister Heather.

The long, data-rich opening remarks by Dr Rogers were followed by a much shorter address by Mr Colin Mandy for the defence, his key point to the jury being that the information provided by the prosecution didn't amount to evidence and that they weren't to base their decision on anything that had so far been presented to the court.

He said several matters raised by Dr Rogers were not in dispute, that Erin Patterson acknowledged that she had lied about having a food dehydrator and also foraging for mushrooms but that she had not knowingly included poisonous mushrooms in the lunch that day, that she was on good terms with both her estranged husband and also her in-laws and had no reason to do them any harm.

He said the incident was a tragic and a terrible mistake and that his client's behaviour after the result of the lunch became clear was a panicked response to the illnesses and deaths, and also the overwhelming publicity and scrutiny which followed.

"You'v got to ask yourself whether it would be possible for someone to panic in that situation," said Mr Mandy. 

It had been anticipated that some witnesses would be heard later in the day on Day 2 but the opening by Dr Rogers had taken up much of the time and Justice Beale concluded proceedings at around 4pm.

Erin Patterson’s husband, Simon Patterson, is scheduled to be the first witness on Thursday, some other witnesses will follow on Friday and Ian Wilkinson is expected to give his evidence on Monday.

The accused woman, Erin Patterson, sat in the rear of the courtroom on Wednesday, wearing a blue and white striped shirt with her brown medium-length hair loose across her shoulders.

Shortly after entering court, one of Ms Patterson’s supporters turned towards her, smiled and waved from the front seats of the public gallery.

All 15 members of the jury, five women and 10 men, were in the court to hear the opening remarks.