The jury in Erin Patterson’s trial sat through weeks of evidence, hearing from the accused herself, lunch guest Ian Wilkinson and a host of experts.
Jurors also viewed videos, pictures, charts and reports.
Last month, a jury used that evidence to find Ms Patterson guilty of murdering her relatives, Don and Gail Patterson and Heather Wilkinson. She was also convicted of the attempted murder of Ian Wilkinson.
There was plenty the jury didn’t hear.
That included details of other attempted murder charges prosecutors laid — and later dropped — against Ms Patterson.
Erin Patterson made more than one visit to the tip
Four days after the July 29, 2023 lunch, Erin Patterson went to the local landfill and dumped a food dehydrator which was later found to have contained traces of death cap mushrooms.
What the jury was not told, however, is that Ms Patterson paid to dispose of more items, and allegedly went to the tip on the day of the lunch itself.
Jurors saw security vision of Erin Patterson dumping the dehydrator, as well as pictures of the item in an e-waste bin and bank transactions from August 2, 2023.
The jury were only told of one trip that Erin Patterson made to the Koonwarra tip. (ABC News)
Evidence about the tip visit on July 29, and further items Ms Patterson allegedly paid to dispose of on August 2, were not put before the jury.
That evidence was ruled out by the judge in the pre-trial phase, and at the time of writing, Justice Beale’s pre-trial rulings had not been publicly released, meaning the decision cannot be reported on in detail.
What is known is that prosecutors were set to claim that Ms Patterson made a visit to the landfill on July 29, the day of the lunch itself, in an act of alleged incriminating conduct.
While the jury was out of the room, prosecutors said there were also transaction records from August 2, 2023 showing Ms Patterson not only made a payment for disposal of the dehydrator in the e-waste waste, but also paid for the disposal of “general waste”.
In order to ensure the jury would not be shown the existence of the inadmissible transactions, an exhibit shown to the court was modified with the judge’s approval.
Events in the courtroom
Each day, jurors saw Erin Patterson sitting in the court dock flanked by two security guards. But the jury was not explicitly told that Ms Patterson had been in custody since her arrest in November 2023.
Due to the trial being held in Morwell, at Ms Patterson’s request, she was transported each weekend from the Dame Phyllis Frost Women’s prison to the cells of the Morwell Police Station.
For the duration of the trial, the court prohibited the publication of images of Ms Patterson suggesting she was in custody.
On the days Ms Patterson gave evidence, her movements were carefully coordinated so that the jury did not see her shift from the dock to the witness box.
Images of Erin Patterson were carefully controlled during her murder trial. (ABC News: Anita Lester)
Jurors also missed moments of emotion Ms Patterson displayed.
Minutes before the jury was set to be empanelled, Ms Patterson was in tears and was consoled by a friend in the court. On another day, while the jury was taking a break, she was doubled over and laughing with security guards.
Witnesses, too, had their moments. In front of a packed court, Simon Patterson said the experience of going through the legal system was difficult and that he was grieving.
One witness, straight after testifying, approached two friends in the court gallery and looked over at Ms Patterson.
“She was greasing me off,” he told them.
Another witness made sure to walk slowly and purposefully while leaving the court building to ensure waiting camera operators and photographers got the perfect shot. He then asked if they wanted him to do it again.
Media scrutiny was intense for each day of the trial in Morwell. (ABC News: Danielle Bonica)
Court tipstaff Stuart Hastings was also kept busy while trying to keep order in the high-profile trial. Numerous people were told to turn off their phones, and one man was kicked out of the courtroom after snapping a selfie during a break.
Complaints also extended to other distractions, namely reporters in the courtroom with a habit of typing furiously on their laptops.
“It is very difficult to concentrate sitting at the bar table with the clackety-clack-clack behind us,” prosecutor Nanette Rogers told Justice Beale.
The judge smiled wryly, asking the “guilty parties” to be mindful of the distraction.
Judge’s split trial ruling
During the pre-trial phase, one of the key disputes between the parties was how seven charges laid against Ms Patterson would be dealt with.
Four charges related to the July 29, 2023 lunch, and the deaths of Don Patterson, Gail Patterson and Heather Wilkinson, and the illness suffered by Ian Wilkinson.
But three other charges related to the alleged attempted poisonings of Simon Patterson, which police said took place in 2021 and 2022.
Erin Patterson was originally facing three charges of attempted murder relating to her husband Simon, but the prosecution dropped them. (AAP: James Ross)
Prosecutors wanted a jury to hear all the charges in one trial. Ms Patterson’s lawyers disagreed, arguing it would be prejudicial and unfair to the defence. Barrister Colin Mandy argued a jury would “misuse” their knowledge of one set of charges while considering the other.
Prosecutors said there were several coincidences, or similarities, between the four events. They pointed to Ms Patterson allegedly preparing and allocating the food for each meal; that her children were not present; and that Simon Patterson said he and the lunch guests became sick after consumption.
“For all five victims, they became really ill after consuming food prepared by the accused for them. The similarity is not about causation, it is about timing,” Crown prosecutor Nanette Rogers SC argued in a February pre-trial hearing.
Nanette Rogers SC served as the lead crown prosecutor in the trial. (AAP: James Ross)
Justice Beale decided to rule out the coincidence evidence and ordered two separate trials. Prosecutors made a last-ditch effort to try and combine the cases again, but were knocked back in the Court of Appeal.
“I suppose it could be said, well, the evidence of [the four lunch charges] appears to be stronger than the evidence on the [three Simon charges],” Court of Appeal Judge Phillip Priest said.
“It’s a very short hop, skip and a jump to convicting on the other three.”
It was then decided that the so-called “lunch trial” was to be held first, with a trial on the Simon Patterson-related charges to follow.
However on the eve of the lunch trial, prosecutors formally discontinued the Simon Patterson-related charges, paving the way for Erin Patterson to face only one criminal trial.
The Facebook ‘cat post’
Another detail not shared with the jury was the alleged existence of a Facebook post that came to be dubbed “the cat post”.
During the trial, while the jury was out of the room, prosecutor Jane Warren told the court the post was made in 2020 by one of Erin Patterson’s Facebook accounts to a page titled “Poisons Help; Emergency Identification For Mushrooms & Plants”.
Ms Warren told the court the text of the post read as follows:
“My cat chewed on this mushroom just now. He is having a vomit. Was in grassland near trees, I’m in Victoria Australia.”
Ms Warren told the court the post was accompanied by photographs later allegedly extracted from one of Ms Patterson’s devices which appeared to show mushrooms the accused had picked in 2020.
Prosecutor Jane Warren addressed the court in relation to an alleged Facebook post. (AAP Image: James Ross)
Before the trial, the photographs were ruled inadmissible as prosecution evidence.
During the trial, Ms Warren summarised to the court that the reason for this was “on the basis that they were not relevant, because they were so far removed in time from what we’re dealing with here”.
She said if the prosecution had been able to make use of the photos in building its case against Ms Patterson, they would have pointed out that “the accused has never owned a cat”.
“Back in 2020, her interest in mushrooms had nothing to do with eating or anything of that nature,” Ms Warren said.
“Her interest in mushrooms was in the poisonous properties of mushrooms and, in our submission, this post supports that inference and it rebuts any inference that she had an interest in foraging or picking mushrooms for the purposes of eating mushrooms.”
During the trial, it was the defence which ultimately introduced the photos included in the post, which were shown to the accused as she told the court she had occasionally foraged mushrooms since the COVID-19 lockdowns in 2020.
Judge resisted suppression orders over trial, discharged juror
Before the second trial was discontinued, prosecutors made a formal application before Justice Christopher Beale for a suppression order.
The application was also supported by the defence, and sought a complete ban on media reporting of the lunch trial until there was an outcome in the second trial relating to Simon Patterson.
Erin Patterson’s defence team is led by Colin Mandy SC (front right). (ABC News)
Suppressions over entire cases have been granted before to protect an accused person’s right to a fair trial before a jury, especially when there are back-to-back cases.
While this often passes without incident, there have been occasions when the outcome of a trial has reached the public despite court orders. Famously, it occurred in 2018 when the late Cardinal George Pell was found guilty in the first of two scheduled County Court trials.
The case has attracted intense media attention. (AAP: James Ross)
On April 17 this year, about two weeks before Erin Patterson’s “lunch trial”, Crown prosecutor Nanette Rogers SC stood before Justice Beale to make submissions about her suppression application.
She was quickly rebuffed by the judge.
“My initial reaction to the application for suppression is that it would be an exercise in futility to make one,” Justice Beale said.
“If I were to make a suppression order it wouldn’t prevent news of the outcome of the first trial spreading like wildfire.”
The prosecution did not follow through with its suppression application after announcing the discontinuance of the Simon Patterson-related charges.
The trial judge declined an early request to make an order to suppress the trial in its entirety, saying it would be “an exercise in futility”. (ABC News: Danielle Bonica)
During the trial, prosecutors and defence lawyers teamed up to call on Justice Beale to prevent media reporting of the fact that one of the jurors had been discharged, after the man allegedly discussed the case with family and friends.
Dr Rogers said media reporting could compromise a potential criminal investigation into the man’s actions.
“At this point in time, there’s been no referral to Victoria Police. It is anticipated, however, that the Juries Commissioner may be invited or asked to conduct an investigation,” she said.
Justice Beale turned down the application, saying a suppression order was not necessary.