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Ian Wilkinson sat in the Victorian supreme court, only metres from the woman accused of trying to murder him, as one of the men who helped save his life gave evidence.
Prof Stephen Warrillow, the director of intensive care at Austin Health, had already spoken about the deaths of three people from death cap mushroom poisoning and the particular characteristics of their illnesses; “rapidly progressive deterioration”, the organ failure and of it being “non-survivable”.
Warrillow treated all the guests at the Austin hospital when they were admitted in the days immediately after the lunch.
Asked on Friday by Sarah Lenthall, for the prosecution, “how close did Ian Wilkinson come to dying”, Warrillow responded: “We thought he was going to die. He was very close.”
Wilkinson, and the three people who died, were all lunch guests of Erin Patterson at her home in regional Australia on 29 July 2023.
They were fed beef wellingtons made with death cap mushrooms. The prosecution says Patterson intended to kill or cause serious harm to her guests, but the defence say it was a terrible accident.
Patterson, 50, faces three charges of murder and one charge of attempted murder relating to the lunch she served at her house in Leongatha.
Patterson has pleaded not guilty to murdering or attempting to murder the relatives of her estranged husband Simon Patterson.
She is accused of murdering his parents, Don and Gail Patterson, and his aunt Heather Wilkinson, and attempting to murder Ian Wilkinson, Simon’s uncle and Heather’s husband.
In his evidence, Warrillow went on to say death cap mushroom poisoning caused “a relentlessly progressive and quite frighteningly rapid deterioration into multiple-organ failure, where the body’s different organ systems essentially shut down and the patient is extremely unwell and at a very high risk of dying”.
Wilkinson had a plasma exchange, and other treatments including specific medications for mushroom poisoning, vitamin C, and multi-dose activated charcoal, which Warrillow said was designed to prevent the body from continuing to internally recycle the amanita, or death cap, poison.
“The treatments are - well, clearly not 100 per cent effective,” Warrillow said.
“In fact, there’s a very high mortality - there’s a high mortality recognised even with what would be considered optimal care.”
Through it all, Wilkinson appeared to barely respond, sitting with his arms crossed, as impassive as he had appeared during the trial. He has sat in court most days since he concluded his evidence, taking a seat with other members of the Patterson and Wilkinson family.
The seats reserved for family are no more than five metres from Patterson, who sits behind them and to their left in the dock in court four of the Latrobe Valley Law Courts.
Warrillow, appearing via videolink, was about the 45th witness called in the case, which is set to continue into a fifth week.
The court also heard evidence this week from Shamen Fox-Henry, a senior digital forensics officer with Victoria police.
He outlined the data extractions performed on devices seized from Patterson’s home shortly after the lunch, with his evidence starting with a slideshow that included the question “what is a computer”.
The devices seized by police, the court heard, contained messages sent to a Facebook group chat by an account named Erin ErinErin, which police allege was used by Patterson. There were more than five members of the chat.
The chat messages, littered with emojis, occurred in early December 2022, at a similar time to other messages previously read to the court between Patterson, Simon, and Don and Gail amid a dispute about child support. Simon previously told the court that on 6 December 2022 he was aware Patterson had messaged his parents to ask for advice about two “main issues”: how their son “was going” and “finances for our kids”.
The messages shown to the court, sent between 6 and 9 December to the group chat, included the Erin ErinErin account saying “this family I swear to fucking god”, that she was “sick of this shit” and “fuck em”.
At 10.19am on 6 December 2022, the account Erin ErinErin wrote to friends on the group chat:
“Simon’s dad contacted me this morning to say that he and Gail had tried to talk to Simon about the matters I raised and to get ‘his side’ but he refused to talk about it other than to signal he disagreed with what I said. Beyond that he won’t talk about it.
“So don said they can’t adjudicate if they don’t know both sides and Simon won’t give his side’. So he said all that he can ask is that Simon and I get together to pray for the children …this family I swear to fucking god.”
Eight minutes later, the account messaged to the group: “I said to him about fifty times yesterday that I didn’t want them to adjudicate…nobody bloody listens to me. At least I know they’re a lost cause.”
The final message read to the court from 6 December 2022 was sent at 10.44am and read in part: “Don rang me last night to say that he thought there was a solution to all this if Simon and I get together and try to talk and pray together…
“I’m sick of this shit I want nothing to do with them. I thought his parents would want him to do the right thing but it seems their concern about not wanting to feel uncomfortable and not wanting to get involved in their sons personal matters are overriding that so fuck em.”
The following day, the Erin ErinErin account messaged the group at 11.20am saying: “His parents sent me a message yesterday afternoon and Simon sent me one last night but I’ve read neither and I don’t think I will. I don’t want to hear it. Simon’s will just be horrible and be gaslighting and abusive and it will ruin my day and his parents will be more weasel words about not getting involved so I think I’m going to just move on.”
An exchange between Patterson and another member of the group about church was read to court, before the Erin ErinErin account wrote another message on 9 December 2022 that read: “His mum was horrified I had claimed child support. Why isn’t she horrified her son is such a deadbeat that I had no choice but to claim?”
The court has previously heard Patterson said she loved Don and Gail like they were her own parents.
The prosecutor, Nanette Rogers SC, made clear in opening the case that the jury “might be wondering, now, why would the accused do this? What is the motive?
“You might still be wondering this at the end of this trial…motive is not something that has to be proven by the prosecution. You do not have to be satisfied what the motive was or even that there was one.
“The prosecution will not be suggesting that there was a particular motive to do what she did. What you will have to…focus your attention on, is whether you are satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that the accused committed the charges…not why she may have done so.”
But Patterson’s lawyer, Colin Mandy SC, told the jury in his opening address that they should consider if she had a motive to kill.
“As you listen to the evidence, you should consider, when it comes to that fundamental issue of Erin’s intention, did she have a motive to kill these four family members?
“What was her relationship with them, especially Don and Gail Patterson? What relationship did her children have with them?
“So that issue, the issue of intention, is the critical issue in this trial.”
The trial before Justice Christopher Beale continues.
