Erin Patterson mushroom murders: Australian woman guilty of murder after serving beef Wellingtons laced with death cap mushrooms to husband's family

Erin Patterson was this morning found guilty after a nine-week trial. It was found that she deliberately served them the poisonous death cap mushrooms for lunch at her home in Leongatha, Victoria state, Australia.

The jury in the Supreme Court trial in Victoria state returned a verdict after six days of deliberations, following a nine-week trial that gripped Australia. Patterson faces life in prison and will be sentenced at a later date.

Patterson, who sat in the dock between two prison officers, showed no emotion but blinked rapidly as the verdicts were read.

What did Erin Patterson do?

Three of Patterson’s four lunch guests — her parents-in-law Don and Gail Patterson, and Gail’s sister Heather Wilkinson — died in hospital after the 2023 meal at her home in Leongatha, at which she served individual beef Wellington pastries containing death cap mushrooms.

She was also found guilty of attempting to murder Ian Wilkinson, Heather’s husband, who survived the meal.

It was not disputed that Patterson served the mushrooms or that the pastries killed her guests. The jury was required to decide whether she knew the lunch contained death caps, and if she intended for them to die.

The guilty verdicts, which were required to be unanimous, indicated that jurors rejected Patterson’s defence that the presence of the poisonous fungi in the meal was a terrible accident, caused by the mistaken inclusion of foraged mushrooms that she did not know were death caps.

Why did Erin Patterson kill her husband’s relatives?

Prosecutors did not offer a motive for the killings, but during the trial highlighted strained relations between Patterson and her estranged husband, and frustration that she had felt about his parents in the past.

The case turned on the question of whether Patterson meticulously planned a triple murder or accidentally killed three people she loved, including her children’s only surviving grandparents.

Her lawyers said she had no reason to do so — she had recently moved to a beautiful new home, was financially comfortable, had sole custody of her children and was due to begin studying for a degree in nursing and midwifery.

But prosecutors suggested Patterson had two faces — the woman who publicly appeared to have a good relationship with her parents-in-law, while her private feelings about them were kept hidden.

Her relationship with her estranged husband, Simon Patterson, who was invited to the fatal lunch but did not go, deteriorated in the year before the deaths, the prosecution said.

The simplest facts of what happened that day and immediately afterwards were hardly disputed. But Patterson’s motivations for what she did and why were pored over in detail during the lengthy trial, at which more than 50 witnesses were called.

What were the key details of the beef Wellingtons?

The individual beef Wellington pastries Patterson served her guests was one point of friction, because the recipe she used contained directions for a single, family-sized portion.

Prosecutors said that she reverted to individual servings, so she could lace the other diners’ portions, but not her own, with the fatal fungi — but Patterson said that she was unable to find the correct ingredients to make the recipe as directed.

Nearly every other detail of the fateful day was scrutinised at length, including why Patterson sent her children out to a film before her guests arrived, why she added additional dried mushrooms to the recipe from her pantry, why she did not become ill when the other diners did, and why she disposed of a food dehydrator after the deaths and told investigators that she did not own one.

Patterson acknowledged some lies during her evidence — including that she had never foraged mushrooms or owned a dehydrator. But she said that those claims were made in panic as she realised her meal had killed people.

She said she did not become as ill as the other diners since she vomited after the meal because of an eating disorder. She denied that she told her guests she had cancer as a ruse to explain why she invited them to her home that day.

Before the verdict, Australian news outlets published photos of black privacy screens erected at the entrance to Patterson’s home. The case has provoked fervour among the public and media, and the courtroom in the rural town of Morwell was packed throughout the trial.

How do you make a beef Wellington?

The BBC’s Good Food website has the following recipe from Gordon Ramsay

Ingredients

• a good beef fillet (preferably Aberdeen Angus) of around 1kg/2lb 4oz
• 3 tbsp olive oil
• 250g/9oz chestnut mushroom include some wild ones if you like
• 50g/2oz butter
• 1 large sprig fresh thyme
• 100ml/3.5 fl oz dry white wine
• 12 slices prosciutto
• 500g/1lb 2oz pack puff pastry (thawed if frozen)
• a little flour for dusting
• 2 egg yolks beaten with 1 tsp water

Method

• Heat oven to 220C/fan 200C/gas 7.
• Sit the 1kg beef fillet on a roasting tray, brush with 1 tbsp olive oil and season with pepper, then roast for 15 mins for medium-rare or 20 mins for medium. When the beef is cooked to your liking, remove from the oven to cool, then chill in the fridge for about 20 mins.
• While the beef is cooling, chop 250g chestnut (and wild, if you like) mushrooms as finely as possible so they have the texture of coarse breadcrumbs. You can use a food processor to do this, but make sure you pulse-chop the mushrooms so they don’t become a slurry.
• Heat 2 tbsp of the olive oil and 50g butter in a large pan and fry the mushrooms on a medium heat, with 1 large sprig fresh thyme, for about 10 mins stirring often, until you have a softened mixture.
• Season the mushroom mixture, pour over 100ml dry white wine and cook for about 10 mins until all the wine has been absorbed. The mixture should hold its shape when stirred.
• Remove the mushroom duxelle from the pan to cool and discard the thyme.
• Overlap two pieces of cling film over a large chopping board. Lay 12 slices prosciutto on the cling film, slightly overlapping, in a double row.
• Spread half the duxelles over the prosciutto, then sit the fillet on it and spread the remaining duxelles over.
• Use the cling film’s edges to draw the prosciutto around the fillet, then roll it into a sausage shape, twisting the ends of cling film to tighten it as you go.
• Chill the fillet while you roll out the pastry.
• Dust your work surface with a little flour. Roll out a third of the 500g pack of puff pastry to a 18 x 30cm strip and place on a non-stick baking sheet.
• Roll out the remainder of the 500g pack of puff pastry to about 28 x 36cm.
• Unravel the fillet from the cling film and sit it in the centre of the smaller strip of pastry.
• Beat the 2 egg yolks with 1 tsp water and brush the pastry’s edges, and the top and sides of the wrapped fillet.
• Using a rolling pin, carefully lift and drape the larger piece of pastry over the fillet, pressing well into the sides.
• Trim the joins to about a 4cm rim. Seal the rim with the edge of a fork or spoon handle.
• Glaze all over with more egg yolk and, using the back of a knife, mark the beef Wellington with long diagonal lines taking care not to cut into the pastry.
• Chill for at least 30 mins and up to 24 hrs. Heat oven to 200C/fan 180C/gas 6.
• Brush the Wellington with a little more egg yolk and cook until golden and crisp – 20-25 mins for medium-rare beef, 30 mins for medium. Allow to stand for 10 mins before serving in thick slices.