Erin Patterson's Chilling Crimes: A Closer Look at the Mushroom Murder House

Join host Elisa as we dive into the chilling case of Erin Patterson, centered around a tragic family lunch involving toxic mushrooms and Beef Wellington.'

Discover the chilling crimes of Erin Patterson as we dive into the deadly mushroom meal that led to a tragic family lunch. 

In this episode, we explore her complex case and the Supreme Court’s recent decisions that have barred her from profiting from her Leongatha home, which has become the focal point of multiple court cases related to the compensation claims stemming from her alleged actions.

 Join the podcast as we draw psychological parallels between Erin and other infamous killers, examining her online personas and the betrayal that unfolded within her true crime community. This episode of The Mushroom Murder Trial Podcast delves deep into the devastating consequences of a meal that took three lives, revealing insights about court trials that will keep you engaged from start to finish.

• Channel 7 news featured Lisa discussing the case outside Erin's house, which friends reportedly covered in black plastic
• Supreme Court restraining order issued July 23 prevents Erin from selling or leveraging her property
• Drawing psychological parallels between Erin Patterson and other killers who approach murder as an intellectual exercise
• Comparing Erin's actions to Shakespearean tragedies like Macbeth and King Lear, examining betrayal and consequences
• Exploring the uncomfortable reality when someone from a true crime community becomes a perpetrator
• Erin's carefully crafted online personas hid her real nature from fellow group members

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Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome and Media Appearance Updates
• 1:34 Erin's House and Court Restraining Order
• 3:06 Understanding Erin's Psychology
• 5:38 Shakespeare and Making Sense of Tragedy
• 9:12 True Crime Communities and Betrayal
• 13:04 Closing Thoughts and Newsletter Reminder

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:01

Hello, my name is Lisa and welcome to the Mushroom Murder Trial podcast. But before we launch into today's updates, head to mushroommurdertrialcom to subscribe to my newsletter. If you haven't yet, please also subscribe to this podcast and review it on your preferred platform so you never miss an episode. Well, we have some news today, quite unexpected. I was on the news Seven news in Melbourne. I'll put a link to the show notes. I didn't expect that at all. So the story is about Erin's house in Leongatha and my friend Heather and I. We went on a mission in May 2024 to Leangatha and South Gippsland. So they've got me talking outside Erin's house at 9am on a Sunday morning. I was not my sharpest, I've got to say that, but I got some words out, so that's got to be good. But they're talking about the story we're now going to follow in, which is about, also surprisingly, erin's house. Now I have a request If you are from Leangatha et cetera, can you please tell me if the black plastic is still covering the house? Because apparently, according to Channel 7, erin's friends were so positive that she was going to be found not guilty that they racked the house in black plastic to keep people like myself out? No doubt. If it's still there, please let me know, because it has to be removed at one point. So here's the latest news Convicted triple murderer Erin Patterson has been barred from selling her home in which she served that deadly meal. It may be used in future compensation claims. So that's what they're doing Erin can't sell the house or leverage it somehow, because there may be future compensation claims. A Supreme Court order made on July 23, according to the ABC, states that no person can quote, dispose of or otherwise deal with her home in Leangatha. It goes on to state that the purpose of the order known as a restraining order, but not as the one we know it's a restraint from selling is to preserve the property so it can be used to satisfy any claim for compensation or restitution. It reads that the court has been satisfied that it is, quote likely that an application for restitution or compensation will be made and that any such order by the court is likely to exceed $20,000. So it's not over yet, is it? We thought we just had the sentencing coming up so there could be compensation. Now the ABC mentions the Sentencing Act 1991, and the matter was heard in closed court. Let's just move along.

Speaker 1: 2:58

Now we're going to talk about Brian Koberger for a moment, the killer of the Idaho Four, now Dr John, who I've mentioned, dr Matthias from the Hidden True Crime podcast. He said a few things a few days ago about Erin that resonated with me and I'm wondering if they resonate with you and I think to me that was a really interesting moment because I think that's what tragedy does to us human beings. It really forces us to figure out whether we have the words to make sense of it and whether we have the ability to make sense of it. We look at the limits of what we human beings are up against and in spite of that we still don't have a choice. We experience this tragedy but we have to respond somehow. That's why you get cave paintings, that's why you get movies and theatre and books and social groups Going on further.

Speaker 1: 3:54

To talk about Koberger, he says like if he has no effect and no emotions. Sounds like someone I know and he's got this intellectual idea. Let's say he wants to test out this theory that he can murder without consequence, that he can get away with it, that he's, as people kept saying in the hearing today, that he thinks he's the smartest one in the room. Sounds like someone I know. What if he thought all that? What if he thought this? He was going to test the hypothesis that he could get away with murder and it wouldn't bother him. Yeah, then it becomes a purely intellectual exercise. I think this is quite relevant with Erin. I believe she thought she could get away with it. She's quite shocked when people caught onto it, even though to most of it it looks very, very obvious the trips to the tip Taking your phone I said this in the last episode taking your phone when you're going to get the dehydrator. But not only that. On top of that, you also took it to the areas where death cap mushrooms have been reported to be located. So I think it was an intellectual exercise to Erin. I think she was bored as well, you know. Anyway, moving right along Now, I think if you're not into English literature, you might want to skip ahead, because I'm going to be following on what Dr John said about how we have to make up ideas and stories and we create as a culture these outcomes to help us understand the indefensible.

Speaker 1: 5:34

And I know some people are like stop trying to work Erin out. Well, okay, that's fine, but I did know her. I think I'm entitled to try and work her out, and if people want to listen and engage with me about that, they can. If you don't want to hear anymore, that's fine. There are other podcasts that are probably better for you. Now Dr John says none of these responses are. There's no right or wrong, there's only tragedy. And then you go into a cave and you paint the pictures on the wall to try and make sense of it. Some of the pictures might be you attacking another tribe that's threatened you, and some of them might be fleeing the situation.

Speaker 1: 6:13

Following on from Dr John's statement that it's human to make sense of tragedy, I too have used words to understand my own life. For example, during a vicious breakup, I left my home and of course it was with a flurry of drama, and actually Heather was with me there too. She was the one that took me to Langatha, and I declared that my presence would lurk inside the apartment like Banquo's ghost from at Beth. So as a reminder of the other resident's most unpleasant past, and much like the tragic characters in some of Shakespeare's plays, erin's actions may be seen as a consequence of an overwhelming fate, a destiny she didn't escape. Was she trapped in her own story or a victim of circumstances, because this is Australia's Cattiest podcast. But in my opinion, erin thinks she's the true sufferer, the true victim, and will want to submit her own victim impact statement during her sentencing. I'm being smart, but like Macbeth, she chose to murder authority figures and carve her own path, despite the dire consequences which should have been obvious to her. Four people on life support, three of them died. You didn't see there'd be consequences, because I'm not sure she really knows or gives a damn about her motivations.

Speaker 1: 7:34

In my opinion, the narratives in Macbeth and King Lear resonate because they revolve around epic betrayals. So Macbeth, for example, murdered a king, but ultimately he betrayed himself, like Aaron, and she allowed anger and resentment to control her life. I think she's bored too as well. The murder of a monarch in Macbeth is a profound violation of trust and duty, just as Erin's actions were betrayals of her own family. Moreover, when King Lear witnesses the treachery of his family, he descends into madness. The monarch becomes progressively unstable due to his disintegrating status and the loss of family love that's so important.

Speaker 1: 8:17

With Erin, she felt the Pattersons were slipping away from her. In my opinion, similar instability was evident in the text messages Erin sent in the days before the lunch, especially that highly manipulative one to Simon. Her connection with the Pattersons was absolutely slipping away and she was infuriated. It wasn't meant to go this way for someone who seemed to think she was above suspicion. Sadly, this is real life. It's not a Shakespearean stage. But Erin will wander for years in the disaster of her own making. She'll carry the weight of her choices, ultimately unable to escape the consequences of her own unravelling story in a prison known for excessive lockdowns. Now, I'm just mentioning that because she'll have a lot of time to sit with her thoughts, because Dangfellas Frost Correctional Centre has an extreme amount of lockdowns. The government says it's because they don't have enough staff.

Speaker 1: 9:19

Erin's story serves as a chilling reminder that sometimes the most dangerous criminals aren't the ones we read about in case files. Sometimes they're the ones sitting beside us or behind a keyboard, and it's not like Freddy Krueger crawling out of a drain. In our online group, erin was an armchair detective fascinated with solving a mystery about a missing baby, but behind the keyboard was someone far more dangerous than we ever could have imagined. A quick search on Google Scholar reveals the true crime community is a burgeoning area of academic research, according to Safa Nadim in Pointing Fingers Moral Judgments and Law perception in true crime communities 2023. Web sleuthing is a phenomenon tied to infotainment, where individuals gather online to analyze cases, share information and sometimes communicate their findings to law enforcement. If only it had stopped there. So a lot of research so far is on so-called fans lusting after Ted Bundy or the Columbine shooting killers or Chris Watts Yuck, but it's called a dark fandom. But we were not Kelly Lane fans that's the woman who was convicted of murdering her baby. We were quite the opposite. Regardless, researchers often refer to some of the true crime groups as a dark fandom.

Speaker 1: 10:46

After the news of the suspicious deaths at Langatha, I was told Erin was far more problematic than I ever knew. I heard about fake social media accounts and her volatility, but that's nothing on her real life and the ongoing damage she did to three generations of two families. True crime communities bring people together in the pursuit of justice, but what happens to everyone when one of you becomes a criminal? The fact is there are people you know online and there are people who hide in plain sight. Erin is the latter, her real persona, crafted behind a veil of carefully curated Facebook accounts which she used to harm people who disagree with her views on Kelly Lane. Because Erin, who once debated legal intricacies with us online, was now convicted of a brutal mass murder.

Speaker 1: 11:39

The disconnect between her online persona and the real-life crimes left our community reeling, combing through past conversations, for missed signs, because sleuthers pride themselves on spotting red flags, but Erin Patterson, she fooled, well, she fooled me at first. This is similar to when reality TV breaks the quote the fourth wall, where the audience is let in on the fact that they're part of a story which is also playing out in real life. Indeed, erin went from discussing true crime to being a central figure in one, as if she'd stepped into the pages of a psychological case study. We often assume crime happens at a distance, to people we don't know, but Erin's presence in our true crime group proves that sometimes the line between casual observer and active participant is thinner than we realise. The fact remains that we knew Erin before the world did Not very well. Obviously, she became the woman accused of poisoning her own family members with death cap mushrooms. No one could have expected that. Perhaps Erin couldn't have expected that, who knows?

Speaker 1: 12:48

So, anyway, I want to say thank you for joining me today. Make sure you sign up for the free newsletter at mushroommurdertrialcom there's a link in the show notes if you'd like to donate $5, but only if you can afford it. I so appreciate your time. It is. I suppose time is just something we're all short of. So thank you for listening. It's truly, really appreciated from the bottom of my dark heart. I shouldn't say that now, should I, because I was in a true crime group with Erin. But anyway, make sure you have a fabulous week and I will catch up with you very, very soon. And don't forget, if you live around Leangatha, go and check out and see if that black plastic's there, because I would love to know. Thanks, bye.