Erin Patterson was assumed to be guilty within days of the beef wellington lunch, and the jury in her triple-murder trial should reject “ridiculous” and “convoluted” propositions to ensure she is not wrongfully convicted, the Victorian supreme court has heard.
Patterson’s barrister, Colin Mandy SC, completed his closing address in her trial on Thursday, telling the jury there was not enough evidence to find her guilty, as the prosecution had assumed “she’s guilty from the start, and then [picked] the pieces of evidence that meet that theory”.
Patterson, 50, is facing three charges of murder and one of attempted murder at the Latrobe Valley law courts in Morwell.
The charges relate to the alleged deliberate poisoning of four lunch guests with beef wellingtons served at her house in Leongatha on 29 July 2023.
Patterson has pleaded not guilty to murdering the relatives of her estranged husband, Simon Patterson – his parents, Don and Gail Patterson, and aunt, Heather Wilkinson – and attempting to murder his uncle, Ian Wilkinson, Heather’s husband.
Mandy said there were four “ridiculous” and “convoluted” propositions relied upon by the prosecution that the jury should reject.
He said it was wrong from the prosecution to tell the jury it did not matter that Patterson had no motive for the alleged crimes, saying that a thorough investigation, including the analysis of electronic devices, messages exchanged with her online friends, and evidence from family witnesses, had found only “18 years’ worth of what we call anti-motive evidence, evidence of why she wouldn’t want to do anything to these people”.
He said the “cancer lie” that Patterson relied upon in order to justify the lunch invitation also should be rejected, given she told none of her guests about it before the lunch, and only told them after they ate the meal.
It was “absurd”, Mandy said, for the prosecution to claim that Patterson thought her guests would take the secret of the cancer “to the grave”, given she had told Simon and his parents about medical issues weeks earlier.
The fourth, he said, was the “illogical” proposition that Patterson thought the lunch guests falling unwell “would all be passed off as some strange case of gastro, where everyone died, except her”.
Mandy said the jury should accept Patterson’s account that she started to panic about being blamed for the lunch after a conversation with Simon on 1 August 2023, when she says he asked her whether she had used a food dehydrator to poison his parents. Simon denies the conversation occurred.
“She was freaking out, people were blaming her … understandably, because any way you look at it, it was her fault,” he said.
“That’s when the wheel starts turning.
“She starts panicking, and she starts lying, from that point.”
He said, however, that none of that conduct should be used by the jury when considering her guilt, including the actions she took to conceal the fact foraged mushrooms went into the meal.
“All of the things she did after the lunch fall into that category, and none of them can actually change the intention she had at the time of the lunch,” he said.
“Either she had the intention [to kill or seriously harm the guests] or she didn’t.
“You can’t change the past because you act badly in the future.”
He also said that the jury should ignore the prosecution claim Patterson deliberately concealed her main phone from police.
Mandy finished his closing address by saying: “When you consider the actual evidence, and consider it properly, methodically, analytically, your verdict on these charges should be not guilty.”
Beale told the jury they would not return to court until Tuesday, and that his closing charge to them would take at least two days. This means the jury is not expected to retire to consider a verdict in the case before Wednesday.