Erin Patterson: For Simon Patterson, his wife’s murder trial has made life even worse

Given his moment to finally describe the pain of watching three close relatives murdered, Simon Patterson did not lash out at the woman who destroyed his family.

Instead, the deeply religious civil engineer used a victim impact statement at his wife’s sentencing proceedings to emphasise the trauma of Erin Patterson’s trial and domestic and international media coverage that has rivalled any similar crime in living memory.

“I miss my parents and aunt more than I can express,” said his statement, which was read by relative Naomi Gleadow. “I am thankful that they are with God and I will see them again.”

Despite numerous opportunities, Mr Patterson has never publicly discussed the fatal poisoning of his parents, Don and Gail Patterson, and aunt Heather Wilkinson two years ago by deadly mushrooms inside a beef Wellington dish.

‘Abrasive legal system’

On Monday, in the Victorian Supreme Court, the reasons for Mr Patterson’s reluctance became clearer. The father of two young children complained about the “trauma caused by an abrasive legal system and occasionally callous mainstream media”.

Even though police investigators and others involved in his wife’s prosecution tried to protect Mr Patterson, he was prohibited from attending the trial before he gave evidence to protect him from being influenced by what others said. Being frozen out, he said, “inhibited my healthy grieving”.

In his victim impact statement, Mr Patterson did not mention an accusation made by his wife’s barrister, Colin Mandy SC, that he was planning to sell his story for a lucrative media pay out.

“You’re here to damage my reputation, because you’re ... paid by Erin and I believe she’s tried to harm me and now you’re her mouthpiece,’’ Mr Patterson told him in court before the trial began.

Mr Patterson is lucky to be alive. He refused to attend the fatal family lunch in Leongatha, Victoria, on 29 July, 2023, believing his wife had previously tried to poison him with a substance similar to rat poison. His loving parents, both devoted members of the local Baptist Church, agreed to go out of respect to their daughter-in-law even though the couple had separated.

Fall out

Most of Mr Patterson’s statement on Monday dealt with the fallout for himself and his children, whose identities have been suppressed to protect their safety. Mr Patterson described a family life ruined, not just by the loss of a mother, but incessant attention from curious, persistent and sometimes aggressive strangers.

He described people “waiting in ambush in my front door” outside their Gippsland home and others who “banged aggressively on our windows at early mornings” and ran off before police came.

“We have been ambushed by strangers with cameras,” his statement said. “The children and I have been filmed in the street.”

To protect the traumatised children from intrusions, Mr Patterson monitors the home’s surrounds with video cameras. After a threat passes, he said he calms them with “a long, reassuring hug”. The children are too young to know their mother is a murderer, but they have come to understand the sound of danger in their father’s voice.

No words

When the family is dining at a cafe and Mr Patterson says “it’s time to go now” - because of unwanted attention - the children have learnt they must immediately leave without fuss.

“Both children are incredibly strong,” he said. “They are wise beyond their years. They both know they are loved.

“Like all of us, they face the daunting challenge of trying to comprehend what she has done. The grim reality is they live in an irreparably broken home with a solo parent when almost everybody knows their mother murdered their grandparents.”

As for his estranged, incarcerated wife, who was present in court, Mr Patterson spent no words on her.

The court also heard from Mr Patterson’s uncle, Ian Wilkinson, who only survived the lunch through a liver transplant. Along with his late wife, brother-in-law and sister-in-law, Mr Wilkinson is a committed Christian. Taking inspiration from the Bible, he made an extraordinary offer to the woman who destroyed his life.

“I make an offer of forgiveness to Erin,” he said. “I have no power or responsibility to forgive harms done to others. I bear her no ill will. My prayer for her is she will use her time in jail wisely to become a better person.”

Justice Christopher Beale will consider 28 victims’ statements when he determines her sentence. After seven were read in court, a prisons’ official gave evidence about the conditions of Patterson’s imprisonment at Dame Phyllis Frost prison in Western Melbourne.

Patterson has access to one other prisoner, a violent terrorist, one hour a day through a mesh fence, according to her lawyer. They have never spoken, and Patterson is likely to remain in almost total isolation for most, if not all, of her sentence, Mr Mandy said.

“Where a prisoner is held is isolation is a factor relevant to sentence,” he said. “She will be held in those conditions for foreseeable future and perhaps the whole of her sentence.”

The judge remarked that Patterson had not expressed remorse, continued to argue her innocence and would likely be notorious for a very long time. He said he read the victims’ statements over the weekend, and remarked that four generations of the one family had been devasted.

“The word ripple effect is often mentioned,” he said in court. “It is more like a tsunami than a ripple.”

Life without parole

Prosecutor Jane Warren asked for the maximum penalty, which is life without parole. She cited aggravating circumstances, including Patterson’s behaviour after the poisonings, when she pretended to be sick too and refused to give information to doctors that might have helped save her victims.

If Patterson only wanted to kill her husband, why did she prepare five poisoned meals, the prosecutor argued in court Monday. “It was her intention to harm all of them at that point,” she said.

Patterson’s lawyer did not try to pretend that his client deserved judicial compassion. “This is very grave offending and we make no argument that the head sentence should be anything other than life imprisonment,” Mr Mandy said in court.

Life is not life, though. Mr Mandy asked Justice Beale to consider making her eligible for parole, perhaps after 30 years, when he noted she would be 80. In other words, he requested Patterson avoid a death sentence, a leniency not granted her victims.