SYDNEY: A woman who died after eating a beef Wellington laced with death cap mushrooms told a doctor it tasted “delicious”, a court heard Wednesday (May 7), as her Australian host faced triple murder charges.
Erin Patterson, 50, is accused of murdering the parents and aunt of her estranged husband by cooking and serving up the poisonous beef-and-pastry meal.
She is also charged with the attempted murder of her husband’s uncle, who survived the dish after a long stay in hospital.
Patterson has pleaded not guilty to all charges.
A hospital doctor testified about two of the four poisoned lunch guests – Heather Wilkinson and her husband Ian, a pastor.
He treated the pair, who are the aunt and uncle of Erin Patterson’s husband, when they were rushed to hospital suffering from vomiting and diarrhoea.
When the couple first arrived, they were “conscious” and “alert”, doctor Christopher Webster told the court in Morwell, southeast of Melbourne.
“They were clearly unwell but were not distressed. They were both able to freely communicate,” he said.
SUSPICION FELL ON MEAT
A day earlier, they lunched on individually prepared beef Wellingtons at Erin Patterson’s home in the sedate Victoria state farm village of Leongatha, the court has heard.
The doctor said he initially suspected the couple had food poisoning from the meat in the beef Wellington.
“I did ask Heather what the beef Wellington tasted like and she said it was delicious,” he told the court.
The next morning, a doctor from another hospital called him to say the two other lunch guests – Erin’s parents-in-law Don and Gail Patterson – had suspected poisoning from death cap mushrooms.
Ian and Heather Wilkinson were then transferred for acute care at another hospital.
Within days, three of the four lunch guests were dead. Ian Wilkinson, the pastor, lived after weeks of hospital treatment.
