Mandysays the jury must engage their heads and not their heart to intellectually examine the evidence.
“It doesn’t matter what you would have done in a situation,” he says.
Mandy says it is impossible for jurors to know how they would behave in a situation.
Mandy saysPattersonhas acknowledged she made lies.
“She’s not on trial for being a liar,” he says.
He says nothing Patterson did afterwards changes what her intention was when she served the beef wellington meal.
Erin Patterson’s defence says prosecution case based on ‘hindsight reasoning’
Colin Mandy SCsays the prosecution has invited the jury to “think about what you would do in the situation if this was really a horrible accident”.
Mandy says the prosecution was inviting the jury to engage in an activity that could be seductive but is flawed because it is based on hindsight.
“What hindsight reasoning does, in a way, is to shift the burden of proof on to the defence,” he says.
“It’s the prosecution’s job to prove what the accused actually did and not to engage in a hypothetical comparison of what you or someone else might do in the same situation.”
Mandy says the prosecution should be relying on the evidence.
He says when you know the outcome of a situation and reflect on it “things might become clear”.
Things seem obvious in retrospect but that’s not the right way of approaching it.
Jury has entered court
The jurors have entered the court room in Morwell.
Patterson’s defence lawyer,Colin Mandy SC, is continuing to deliver his closing address to the jury.
Here’s a recap of what the jury heard yesterday:
ProsecutorNanette Rogers SCtold the juryErin Patterson“targeted her search” for death cap mushrooms to poison the beef wellingtons she served her lunch guests on 29 July 2023.
Patterson cannot be accepted as a truthful and trustworthy witness, Rogers said. In the final moments of her closing address, she said if the jury combines all the evidence in the trial they will be satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that Patterson deliberately sourced death cap mushrooms and deliberately included them in the beef wellingtons she served her guests.
Patterson’s defence lawyer,Colin Mandy SC, said the prosecution had a “flawed approach” in analysing the evidence and “discarded inconvenient truths”. He told the jury to consider whether there is a reasonable possibility that death cap mushrooms were put into the beef wellingtons accidentally. He said jurors should also consider whether there is a reasonable possibility that Patterson did not intend to kill or cause serious injury to her guests.
Mandy said his client had no motive and “very good reasons” not to harm her lunch guests. “If you do embark on this plan … you’ll lose the only people in the world who are any support to you and your children, you will lose your children and you will lose everything that’s important to you,” he said.
Mandy said that while Patterson had a right to silence and was under no obligation to testify in the trial, she chose to give evidence in the trial. In doing so, he said, she opened herself up to days of cross-examination by an experienced barrister and the “scrutiny of the whole world”.
Welcome to day 34 ofErin Patterson’s triple murder trial.
Patterson’s defence lawyer,Colin Mandy SC, will continue delivering his closing address when the trial resumes from 10.30am.
Justice Christopher Bealehas told the jury he will begin instructing them on Monday, before their deliberations. He said this “could spill” into next Wednesday. Once this is concluded, the jurors will retire to consider their verdicts.
Patterson, 50, faces three charges of murder and one charge of attempted murder relating to a beef wellington lunch she served at her house in Leongatha, in regionalVictoria, on 29 July 2023.
She is accused of murdering her in-laws,DonandGail Patterson, and her estranged husband’s aunt,Heather Wilkinson. The attempted murder charge relates to Heather’s husband,Ian.
She has pleaded not guilty to the charges.
The prosecution alleges Patterson deliberately poisoned her lunch guests with “murderous intent” but her lawyers say the poisoning was a tragic accident.