Australia’s Court of Appeal in Victoria has dismissed Erin Patterson’s bid to overturn her triple murder convictions and, in the same ruling, removed her chance of parole, meaning she will spend the rest of her life in prison.
Patterson, 52, was found guilty in July 2025 of murdering three people at a family lunch at her home in Leongatha, Victoria, in July 2023. She served beef Wellington laced with highly toxic death cap mushrooms, killing her estranged husband’s parents, Don and Gail Patterson, and Gail’s sister, Heather Wilkinson. A fourth guest, Heather’s husband Ian Wilkinson, a pastor, survived after weeks in hospital, and Patterson was also convicted of his attempted murder.
Patterson had asked the court to quash her convictions or order a retrial, arguing she had suffered a miscarriage of justice. Her lawyers put forward seven grounds of appeal, including complaints about how the jury was sequestered and about evidence admitted at trial, such as mobile phone data placing her near locations where death cap mushrooms had been reported.
The three appeal judges rejected every ground. They found there was no objective basis to conclude the jury had not discharged its function according to law, and that the disputed evidence was admissible as part of the prosecution’s wider circumstantial case. Describing the offending as “extraordinarily cold and calculated”, Justice Stephen McLeish said it was inappropriate to fix a non-parole period, given what he called its shocking criminality. The court also described the murders as carefully planned and deliberate and a cruel breach of trust.
Patterson had originally been given three life sentences for the murders and 25 years for attempted murder, with a non-parole period of 33 years, which would have left her in her 80s before she could seek release. Prosecutors appealed that minimum term as manifestly inadequate, and the appeal court agreed, setting it aside and declining to set a new one. Patterson, who appeared by video link from prison, showed no emotion as the ruling was read, according to reporters in court.
Source: CNN (https://www.cnn.com/2026/10/29/australia/australia-mushroom-patterson-appeal-ruling-intl-hnk?cid=external-feeds_iluminar_meta) and The Straits Times (https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/australianz/australian-mushroom-murderer-loses-appeal-court)
