Erin Patterson trial: Digital forensics officer finds record of iNaturalist searches on computer found in alleged poisoner’s home

Online searches for citizen science website iNaturalist were located on a computer taken from alleged triple-murderer Erin Patterson’s home, her trial has been told.

Appearing in the witness box on Wednesday, Victoria Police senior digital forensic officer Shamen Fox-Henry gave evidence of the forensic analysis conducted on devices seized from Ms Patterson’s home.

He told the court that he extracted and processed data from three storage devices located inside a Cooler Master computer, applying a key word search for “death cap, death cap mushroom, death cap mushrooms, mushrooms and poison”.

A report created on March 16, 2024, was shown to the jury, depicting cache data of searches for “iNaturalist” using the Bing search engine at 7.20pm on March 28, 2022.

Asked to explain what that meant, Mr Fox-Henry said: “The search term iNaturalist was conducted by Bing using the Edge browser.”

Another record captures a visit to the iNaturalist web page at 7.20.42pm through the Microsoft Edge browser.

Quizzed by Justice Christopher Beale about whether a visit count located in the record indicated this was the first visit to that specific URL, Mr Fox-Henry said “it should be”.

Mr Fox-Henry said another record captured a visit to a iNaturalist webpage at 7.23pm.

“Deathcap from Melbourne, Vic, Australia on May 18 2022 … Bricker Reserve, Moorabbin - iNaturalist,” the headline for the page captured reads, the jury was told.

Just 21 seconds later another record captures a Google search for Korumburra Middle Pub at 7.23.39pm.

Prosecutor Jane Warren the took Mr Fox-Henry to Google Chrome auto-fill artifacts captured by the report, showing the name Erin Patterson and a mobile phone number were auto-filled about the same time.

Mr Fox-Henry is expected to resume giving evidence when the trial continues on Thursday. Earlier in the trial, two witnesses gave evidence that they located death cap mushrooms in towns near Leongatha where Ms Patterson lived and posted details, including precise locations, on iNaturalist.

Christine McKenzie said she posted about the mushrooms in Loch on April 18, 2023, while Dr Tom May posted a sighting of death caps in Outtrim on May 21 the same year.

Earlier, jurors in the trial were shown a PowerPoint presentation explaining what digital forensics is.

The 14-member jury returned to the courtroom at 12.35pm and were told by Justice Christopher Beale that the morning’s delay was explained by parties dealing with an “issue”.

“We’ve been dealing with an issue this morning and that might occupy some more time this afternoon, but we’ll press on with some witnesses,” he said.

Victoria Police senior digital forensic officer Shamen Fox-Henry was called to give evidence, explaining to the jury that he worked for the cybercrime squad to extract and analyse data from electronic devices.

Jurors began to view a presentation created by Mr Fox-Henry on digital forensics.

The first slide was titled “what is a computer?” before the presentation moved on to outline how police dealt with electronic devices.

Mr Fox-Henry explained how forensic officers could create a digital clone of an electronic device to provide to investigators to comb through for anything relevant using keywords.

He told the jury that the individual data points were known as “artifacts” and could be analysed by recovery software.

Ms Patterson is facing trial after pleading not guilty to the murder of three of her husband Simon Patterson’s relatives and the attempted murder of another after a fatal beef wellington lunch on July 29, 2023.

9s bathroom visit on camera

CCTV of Ms Patterson’s nine-second bathroom break a day after hosting the fatal mushroom lunch has been shown to the jury.

In the footage, Ms Patterson arrives at the petrol station in her red MG car and makes a beeline for the bathroom wearing a grey long-sleeved top and white pants.

She leaves the rest room nine seconds later before spending about two minutes roaming the store picking items before paying and leaving.

Giving evidence on Tuesday, homicide squad detective Senior Constable Khuong Tran said he attended the petrol station to obtain the videos on August 28 as part of a police probe into the deaths.

Shortly after the CCTV was played, Constable Tran was stood down from the witness box and the jury was sent home for the day about 45 minutes early after prosecutor Jane Warren said a “matter” had been raised that needed to be sorted out.

Ms Patterson is facing trial accused of murdering her husband Simon Patterson’s parents, Don and Gail Patterson, and his aunt Heather Wilkinson with a poisoned beef Wellington served on July 29, 2023.

She is also accused of attempting to murder Heather’s husband Ian Wilkinson, with her defence arguing the poisonings were not deliberate.

At the start of the trial, Crown prosecutor Nanette Rogers SC told the jury it was alleged the morning after the lunch, Ms Patterson told her children she’d been sick all night.

“She said she then experienced diarrhoea later that evening, occurring every 20 minutes and lasting all night,” Dr Rogers said.

That afternoon, the jury was told, Ms Patterson drove her teenage son to Tyabb – about a 90 minute drive away – for a flying lesson.

On the journey, she stopped at a BP service station in Caldermeade, where Ms Patterson purchased sour confectionery, a ham, cheese and tomato sandwich and a sweet chilli chicken wrap after stepping into the bathroom for nine seconds.

About 20 minutes later, the jury was told, the flight instructor called Ms Patterson, cancelling the lesson due to bad weather.

They were close to Tyabb, but she turned around and drove back to Leongatha.

“They drove without any indication from the accused that she needed to use the toilet,” Dr Rogers said.

“At no stage during the whole trip did the accused use a toilet or indicate that she needed to use a toilet.”

Ms Patterson has pleaded not guilty to three counts of murder and one count of attempted murder.

Gail Patterson and Heather Wilkinson both died on August 5 of death cap mushroom poisoning while Don Patterson died the following day.

Ian Wilkinson slowly recovered and was discharged from hospital in mid September.

Prosecutors allege Ms Patterson deliberately spiked the lunch with “murderous intent”, while her defence argues the case is a “tragic accident”.

The trial continues.