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The Beef Wellington Murders · Crime Night

0:00
Speaker 1: I want to take you to this seemingly perfect warm
0:03
Speaker 1: Sunday afternoon. Okay, it's July twenty nine, twenty twenty three.
0:07
Speaker 1: Picture a really cozy dining room.
0:09
Speaker 2: Right.
0:09
Speaker 1: The table is beautifully set with these slightly mismatched plates,
0:13
Speaker 1: giving it that rustic, homey feel.
0:15
Speaker 2: Oh. I love that very welcoming exactly.
0:18
Speaker 1: And the rich savory smell of individual beef wellingtons baking
0:22
Speaker 1: in the oven is just filling the air. The family
0:24
Speaker 1: gathers around the table, they're holding hands, and a loving
0:27
Speaker 1: prayer is said before the meal.
0:29
Speaker 2: It sounds like a perfect Sunday roast.
0:30
Speaker 1: It is the very picture of warmth, safety and familial duty.
0:36
Speaker 1: But that warmth it was a complete illusion, right, because
0:40
Speaker 1: that dining table was actually a carefully laid trap. And
0:43
Speaker 1: the chef who just bowed her head in prayer, she
0:45
Speaker 1: was serving a literal death sentence.
0:47
Speaker 2: It's a genuinely chilling image because you are looking at
0:51
Speaker 2: the ultimate weaponization of trust.
0:53
Speaker 1: Yeah.
0:53
Speaker 2: Absolutely, And to understand how this happened, we're pulling from
0:56
Speaker 2: a massive stack of primary sources for you today. We're
0:59
Speaker 2: diving into like thousands of pages of investigative case.
1:02
Speaker 1: File and medical toxicology journals too, right, Yes, those plus
1:07
Speaker 1: raw digital forensics logs and the incredibly grueling court transcripts
1:12
Speaker 1: of the Aaron Patterson case. It's a lot of material,
1:15
Speaker 1: it is.
1:15
Speaker 2: But as investigators laying out the facts, our mission today
1:19
Speaker 2: is to strip away all the sensational media noise. We
1:22
Speaker 2: just want to piece together the raw evidence for you
1:25
Speaker 2: to unravel, step by meticulous step.
1:28
Speaker 1: I am honestly still in a state of sheer disbelief
1:30
Speaker 1: reading through these files.
1:32
Speaker 2: It's tough one to process.
1:33
Speaker 1: I mean, how does a forty eight year old, supposedly
1:36
Speaker 1: loving mother just transform into a mass murderer right before
1:41
Speaker 1: her family's eyes. Okay, let's unpack this, let's do it.
1:43
Speaker 1: Where do we even begin with someone who meticulously plots
1:46
Speaker 1: the murder of their own family?
1:47
Speaker 2: Well, what's fascinating here is the sheer level of premeditation,
1:51
Speaker 2: you know, hidden beneath that veneer of familial duty. To
1:54
Speaker 2: understand the trap, you really first have to understand the bait.
1:57
Speaker 1: Right. The relationships were already pretty strange, very strange.
2:01
Speaker 2: Aaron Patterson and her husband Simon have been separated for
2:04
Speaker 2: some time. They were maintaining a very fragile piece mostly
2:09
Speaker 2: for the sake of their two kids.
2:10
Speaker 1: But Aaron stayed close to his family, right she did.
2:13
Speaker 2: She made a point to stay remarkably close to Simon's parents,
2:17
Speaker 2: Gail and Don, and she was even friendly with Simon's
2:20
Speaker 2: an and uncle Heather and Ian.
2:22
Speaker 1: And Ian was actually a pastor at the church they
2:24
Speaker 1: all went to exactly.
2:25
Speaker 2: So they were still actively in each other's lives going
2:28
Speaker 2: to the same church.
2:29
Speaker 1: But I'm wondering, how do you get estranged, deeply tense
2:33
Speaker 1: family members to agree to sit down for a home
2:35
Speaker 1: cooked meal.
2:36
Speaker 2: You use a vulnerability they literally can't ignore.
2:39
Speaker 1: Which is just so manipulative.
2:41
Speaker 2: It really is. So. After a church service in early July,
2:45
Speaker 2: Aaron pulls her in laws asign. She tells them she
2:48
Speaker 2: wants to have everyone over for a special lunch in
2:50
Speaker 2: a couple of weeks to discuss a serious health issue.
2:53
Speaker 1: Oh wow, what did she say? Was wrong?
2:55
Speaker 2: She claims she has cancer.
2:57
Speaker 1: I mean it is the ultimate trojan horse. Truly, she
3:01
Speaker 1: uses the most powerful shields we have as humans, right, cancer, family,
3:05
Speaker 1: and religion. She uses all of that just to maneuver
3:08
Speaker 1: her targets into that.
3:09
Speaker 2: Room, Because who is going to say no to a
3:11
Speaker 2: mother asking for help with the cancer diagnosis.
3:13
Speaker 1: Right, no one with a conscience exactly.
3:16
Speaker 2: So the data set for July twenty ninth, the guest
3:19
Speaker 2: list is supposed to be Aaron, her estranged husband, Simon,
3:22
Speaker 2: Simon's parents, and the aunt and uncle.
3:25
Speaker 1: But the night before this lunch, a crucial variable changes.
3:29
Speaker 2: Yes, Simon bales.
3:30
Speaker 1: What made him pull out at the eleventh hour like.
3:32
Speaker 2: That the tension between him and Aaron over child support
3:35
Speaker 2: and finances had simply reached a boiling point. The case
3:39
Speaker 2: falls show he texts her basically saying he just doesn't
3:42
Speaker 2: have it in him to sit through an awkward family lunch.
3:45
Speaker 1: He just couldn't pretend everything was fine, right.
3:48
Speaker 2: He does offer to discuss her health issues over the phone,
3:50
Speaker 2: but he absolutely refuses to come to the house.
3:53
Speaker 1: I want to focus on Aaron's reaction to that cancelation,
3:56
Speaker 1: because looking at the text logs, it is just bone shilling.
3:59
Speaker 1: Can you walk us through what she sent back to him.
4:02
Speaker 2: Oh, she lays the guilt on incredibly thick. She texts
4:06
Speaker 2: him that his absence is deeply disappointing.
4:08
Speaker 1: And she brings up the food, doesn't she She does.
4:11
Speaker 2: She specifically points out how she spent a quote small
4:14
Speaker 2: fortune on beef I file at, and how exhausting the
4:17
Speaker 2: preparation was in light of her supposed cancer. And then
4:21
Speaker 2: she drops this really ominous line. She writes that she
4:26
Speaker 2: quote may not be able to host a lunch like
4:29
Speaker 2: this again for some time, which.
4:31
Speaker 1: Carries a terrifying double meaning once you know what was
4:33
Speaker 1: actually baking in the oven exactly. But even without Simon,
4:36
Speaker 1: the lunch proceeds. Aaron serves these super labor intensive individual
4:41
Speaker 1: beef wellingtons.
4:43
Speaker 2: They pray, they eat, and she asks this table of
4:46
Speaker 2: devout caring relatives for advice on how to break her
4:50
Speaker 2: devastating cancer news to her young kids.
4:53
Speaker 1: They are sitting there counseling her Ian the pastor is
4:56
Speaker 1: literally leading them in prayer for her survival, and.
4:59
Speaker 2: They are completely unaware of the biological reality of what
5:02
Speaker 2: they just ingested.
5:04
Speaker 1: That is just so dark it is.
5:06
Speaker 2: And this is where the science of the poison becomes
5:08
Speaker 2: crucial to understanding the timeline of.
5:09
Speaker 1: This case, right because it wasn't instant exactly.
5:12
Speaker 2: They leave that house praying for her, and they feel
5:14
Speaker 2: totally fine. It isn't until roughly twelve hours later, in
5:17
Speaker 2: the middle of the night, the nightmare begins.
5:19
Speaker 1: They all get sick at the same time.
5:21
Speaker 2: Yeah, all four guests are struck with severe, violent symptoms.
5:25
Speaker 2: We're talking relentless vomiting and diarrhea.
5:27
Speaker 1: And it was bad enough to go to the hospital
5:29
Speaker 1: right away.
5:29
Speaker 2: It's so catastrophic that Simon ends up driving his aunt
5:33
Speaker 2: and uncle to the hospital while his parents are rushed
5:35
Speaker 2: there by ambulance.
5:36
Speaker 1: Okay, I have to ask about the twelve hour delay,
5:39
Speaker 1: because if I eat something toxic, my body usually rejects
5:42
Speaker 1: it immediately, right normally. Yeah, So why did this take
5:44
Speaker 1: half a day to show up?
5:46
Speaker 2: Well? Because deathcat mushrooms contain a highly complex toxin called
5:50
Speaker 2: amatoxin amatoxin okay, Yeah, And unlike a typical food borne
5:54
Speaker 2: bacteria that irritates your stomach lining immediately, amatoxin is stealthy.
5:59
Speaker 2: It actually serve the heat of the oven.
6:01
Speaker 1: Oh wow, so cooking doesn't destroy it.
6:03
Speaker 2: Not at all. It passes right through the stomach and
6:05
Speaker 2: silently travels to the liver. Once there, it enters the
6:08
Speaker 2: cells and binds to an enzyme called RNA polymerase two.
6:12
Speaker 1: What does that enzyme do?
6:13
Speaker 2: It's responsible for creating proteins By binding to it. The
6:17
Speaker 2: amatoxin effectively halts protein synthesis entirely.
6:20
Speaker 1: So the cells just they stop working.
6:22
Speaker 2: Worse, the liver cells literally starve and self destruct from
6:27
Speaker 2: the inside out. That is horrific, it really is. By
6:30
Speaker 2: the time the gastrointestinal symptoms show up twelve hours later,
6:34
Speaker 2: the liver is already fundamentally destroyed.
6:36
Speaker 1: Wow, so you put yourself in the shoes of the
6:39
Speaker 1: emergency room staff. Within twenty four hours you have four
6:42
Speaker 1: people from the exact same family admitted in critical condition.
6:46
Speaker 2: And they trace it back to a single meal.
6:48
Speaker 1: But noticeably absent from this chaotic hospital scene is the
6:52
Speaker 1: chef herself. Where is Aaron?
6:54
Speaker 2: Oh, she is sitting at home texting Simon that she
6:57
Speaker 2: is too sick with diarrhea to risk driving.
6:59
Speaker 1: But then she shows up on day two, Right she does.
7:02
Speaker 2: She finally shows up to the hospital and she walks
7:04
Speaker 2: in looking perfectly fine.
7:05
Speaker 1: I mean, if I am an er doctor watching four
7:08
Speaker 1: patients rapidly deteriorating from acute liver failure, and the person
7:12
Speaker 1: who cooked the meal strolls in without a scratch, right,
7:15
Speaker 1: every alarm bell in my head is ringing. How did
7:17
Speaker 1: she explain herself?
7:18
Speaker 2: She remains incredibly calm. She tells the medical staff that
7:22
Speaker 2: she used a mix of mushrooms for the wellingtons. Yeah.
7:24
Speaker 2: She claims she used fresh ones from a standard commercial
7:27
Speaker 2: supermarket Woolworth's, and dried when she bought months ago from
7:31
Speaker 2: some unnamed Asian grocer in Oakley or Glenn.
7:34
Speaker 1: Waverley, which is a brilliant, terrifying lie, it really is,
7:38
Speaker 1: because if you tell a doctor that a deadly toxin
7:41
Speaker 1: might be in the commercial food supply, I mean, panic
7:44
Speaker 1: sets in. The focus shifts from a homicide investigation to
7:47
Speaker 1: a massive public health crisis exactly.
7:50
Speaker 2: And yet Aaron herself doesn't seem panicked at all, not
7:53
Speaker 2: at all. In fact, after just five minutes in the
7:55
Speaker 2: hospital well the doctor steps away to process this information.
7:58
Speaker 2: She bolts, she leaves against medical.
8:01
Speaker 1: Advice, and that specific moment is the inciting incident that
8:05
Speaker 1: pivots this whole thing from a medical mystery into a
8:07
Speaker 1: criminal investigation.
8:09
Speaker 2: Yes, doctor Chris Webster realizes the absolute gravity of the situation.
8:14
Speaker 1: What does he do?
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Speaker 2: He makes an urgent, thous zero zero emergency call, which
8:18
Speaker 2: is the equivalent of nine to one to one from
8:19
Speaker 2: lean Goffa.
8:20
Speaker 1: Hospital directly to the police, directly.
8:22
Speaker 2: To the police. He carefully but urgently explains that a
8:27
Speaker 2: patient exposed to a fatal tosin has just fled the
8:30
Speaker 2: building while her four guests are being transferred to Danding
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Speaker 2: Hospital in critical condition.
8:36
Speaker 1: So he essentially forces law enforcement to look directly at
8:40
Speaker 1: Aaron Catterson.
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Speaker 2: He does, and it's a very good thing he made
8:43
Speaker 2: that call, because she comes back to the hospital voluntarily shortly.
8:47
Speaker 1: After, and then drops another bombshell.
8:49
Speaker 2: A massive one. She casually mentions to the staff that
8:53
Speaker 2: she actually fed the leftover beef Wellington to her kids
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Speaker 2: the previous night.
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Speaker 1: Her kids. Are you serious?
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Speaker 2: Yes, she claims, she just scraped the mushrooms off the
9:02
Speaker 2: meat before serving it to them.
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Speaker 1: I can't even The doctors must have demanded she bring
9:06
Speaker 1: the kids in immediately.
9:08
Speaker 2: They do, and Erin actually resists, what why? She says,
9:12
Speaker 2: they're at school and she quote doesn't want to scare them.
9:15
Speaker 2: The doctor literally has to tell her they can be
9:17
Speaker 2: scared and alive or dead.
9:20
Speaker 1: That gives me chills. So the kids are rushed in.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, and the doctors immediately run blood panels looking for
9:25
Speaker 2: metabolic acidosis.
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Speaker 1: Let's pose right there for you listening, what exactly is
9:29
Speaker 1: metabolic acidosis, and why were they looking for in the kids.
9:33
Speaker 2: It's a really severe condition where your blood becomes dangerously acidic. Okay,
9:37
Speaker 2: Your liver and kidneys normally work together to balance your
9:40
Speaker 2: body's pH levels by clearing out toxins and acids. But
9:45
Speaker 2: when a liver starts failing from ematoxin poisoning, it stops
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Speaker 2: clearing those acids, so.
9:50
Speaker 1: The acid just builds up in the blood.
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Speaker 2: Exactly the blood's pH drops the lethal levels. It is
9:55
Speaker 2: one of the definitive markers that your organs are shutting down.
10:00
Speaker 1: When they run these panels on the kids, they are completely.
10:04
Speaker 2: Fine, totally fine, zero acidosis.
10:06
Speaker 1: Which, honestly, it breaks my brain. How So, if you
10:09
Speaker 1: are a killer trying to cover up a poisoning, why
10:12
Speaker 1: on earth would you risk feeding the potentially poisoned leftovers
10:16
Speaker 1: to your own children.
10:18
Speaker 2: Well, if we connect this to the bigger picture, you
10:20
Speaker 2: realize this wasn't reckless madness at all. It was a
10:23
Speaker 2: highly calculated chess move.
10:24
Speaker 1: Okay, walk me through that logic.
10:26
Speaker 2: She knew the kids wouldn't get sick because she was
10:28
Speaker 2: the chef. She controlled exactly what went onto their plates
10:32
Speaker 2: during the cooking process, so she.
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Speaker 1: Probably baked there's entirely separate from the poison batch.
10:37
Speaker 2: Most likely yes. By feeding them the leftover meat, she
10:41
Speaker 2: was attempting to establish an airtight alibi. She wanted to
10:45
Speaker 2: prove to investigators that the meat itself was safe.
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Speaker 1: Ah, isolating the blame entirely onto those mysterious quote store
10:53
Speaker 1: bought mushrooms.
10:54
Speaker 2: You've got it. It showed a terrifying level of control.
10:57
Speaker 1: It really does. It's so cold blooded. But because doctor
11:01
Speaker 1: Webster's thousand zero call brought the police into the fold,
11:04
Speaker 1: law enforcement immediately begins pulling apart that alibi.
11:07
Speaker 2: They don't waste any time.
11:08
Speaker 1: Right, They start hunting for this mythical Asian grocer. They're
11:12
Speaker 1: scouring CCTV footage and financial records, and they come up
11:15
Speaker 1: totally empty.
11:16
Speaker 2: Meanwhile, the tragedy deepens. Within a week, Gail Down and
11:20
Speaker 2: Heather All pass away from altered liver function and multiple
11:23
Speaker 2: organ failure, and Ian only Ian the pastor miraculously survives
11:28
Speaker 2: after weeks in the ICU.
11:29
Speaker 1: Wow. So, with three people dead, the investigation shifts heavily
11:32
Speaker 1: toward the physical and digital evidence.
11:34
Speaker 2: Right now, Yes, because Aaron had explicitly told police during
11:37
Speaker 2: her initial interviews, that she never foraged for mushrooms.
11:40
Speaker 1: And she says she didn't even own a food dehydrator.
11:43
Speaker 2: Didn't she right? She claimed she had nothing to do
11:45
Speaker 2: with drawing mushrooms, But.
11:47
Speaker 1: The financial records tell a completely different story.
11:49
Speaker 2: They absolutely do. Police discover that on April twenty eighth,
11:54
Speaker 2: twenty twenty three, just a few months before the lunch,
11:57
Speaker 2: she purchased a brand new high and food dehydrator.
12:01
Speaker 1: And they found it too.
12:02
Speaker 2: They did even more damning CCTV footage catches her dumping
12:07
Speaker 2: that exact dehydrator at a local waste facility on August.
12:11
Speaker 1: Second, which is right as the heat was turning up
12:13
Speaker 1: and her family members were dying in the hospital exactly.
12:16
Speaker 2: So police recover the machine, swab it and lab tests
12:20
Speaker 2: confirm traces of death cap mushrooms on the drying racks.
12:23
Speaker 1: Here's where it gets really interesting, because you don't just
12:26
Speaker 1: stumble upon death cap mushrooms, No you don't. They aren't
12:29
Speaker 1: just you know, growing in your backyard lawn. You have
12:31
Speaker 1: to actively hunt for them. So how did the police
12:34
Speaker 1: prove she went looking for them?
12:36
Speaker 2: This is where digital forensics absolutely dismantle her story.
12:39
Speaker 1: I love this part. What did they find police.
12:41
Speaker 2: Pull her Internet search history and find she had been
12:44
Speaker 2: heavily browsing a site called I Naturalist, starting way back
12:48
Speaker 2: in May twenty twenty two.
12:49
Speaker 1: I Naturalists. That's a community app.
12:51
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, it's a community mapping app where forgers and
12:55
Speaker 2: nature enthusiast log rare sightings of flora and fauna.
12:58
Speaker 1: Okay, so she's looking at mushroom logs, right.
13:01
Speaker 2: And the logs showed that on April eighteenth and May
13:04
Speaker 2: twenty one of twenty twenty three, users had pinned death
13:07
Speaker 2: cap sidings in two specific rural towns, Lock and Ultram.
13:13
Speaker 1: But browsing a website isn't proof of foraging. I mean
13:16
Speaker 1: I look at weird stuff online all the time. How
13:17
Speaker 1: did they put her physically at those locations?
13:20
Speaker 2: Through cell tower triangulation and metadata?
13:23
Speaker 1: Okay, explain how that works for our listeners.
13:25
Speaker 2: Your mobile phone is essentially a tracking beacon. Even if
13:28
Speaker 2: you aren't making a call, your phone is constantly shaking
13:31
Speaker 2: hands with the nearest cell towers to maintain a signal.
13:34
Speaker 2: By subpoenaing those logs, digital forensic analysts can triangulate your
13:38
Speaker 2: location with shocking accuracy. The data placed Erin's phone traveling
13:42
Speaker 2: to those exact coordinates in lock and Ultraum right after
13:46
Speaker 2: the sightings were posted. Furthermore, the location data shows her
13:49
Speaker 2: purchasing that infamous food dehydrator at a store on her
13:53
Speaker 2: way home from one of those specific foraging trips.
13:56
Speaker 1: It's like she was leaving digital breadcrumbs in the forest,
13:59
Speaker 1: but instead of finding her way home, she was navigating
14:01
Speaker 1: straight to poison.
14:02
Speaker 2: It really is. And the files also showed they found
14:05
Speaker 2: a photo on her tablet of the mushrooms. Yes, it
14:08
Speaker 2: was an image of mushrooms sitting on a kitchen scale.
14:12
Speaker 2: A mycologist, a mushroom expert, looked at the raw image
14:15
Speaker 2: file and identified them definitively as death caps.
14:19
Speaker 1: So all this physical and location evidence proved exactly how
14:23
Speaker 1: she did it. Yes, but the police still needed to
14:25
Speaker 1: answer why she did.
14:26
Speaker 2: It, and they found that answer when they executed a
14:28
Speaker 2: search warrant on her home on August.
14:31
Speaker 1: Fifth, which uncovered this bizarre technological shell game right exactly.
14:36
Speaker 2: It completely revealed the dark psychological motive behind the murders.
14:39
Speaker 1: Okay, so imagine you are the police executing the search warrant.
14:42
Speaker 1: You are standing in her living room. Aaron asks for
14:45
Speaker 1: a moment of trivacy to quote, call her lawyer, right,
14:49
Speaker 1: but instead of making a call, what is she actually doing?
14:51
Speaker 2: Digital data logus were covered later showed that in those
14:54
Speaker 2: few minutes, she is frantically swapping simcards between three different
15:00
Speaker 2: mobile phones three Phonsy had two Samsungs and an Nokia,
15:03
Speaker 2: and she actually initiates a hard factory reset on one
15:07
Speaker 2: of the devices right unto the police's noses.
15:10
Speaker 1: So she thinks she's erasing the evidence right there.
15:12
Speaker 2: She definitely thinks that.
15:13
Speaker 1: But a factory reset doesn't actually work the way most
15:16
Speaker 1: people think it does at all.
15:18
Speaker 2: A factory reset on a modern smartphone doesn't immediately scrub
15:22
Speaker 2: the physical flash memory chips inside the device.
15:25
Speaker 1: So the data isn't just gone.
15:27
Speaker 2: No, it mostly just deletes the index. Think of it
15:29
Speaker 2: like destroying the map that tells the phone's operating system
15:32
Speaker 2: where the files are stored. Oh, I see the actual
15:35
Speaker 2: raw hex data of those text messages, photos and applogs
15:39
Speaker 2: is still sitting on the flash memory until it gets
15:41
Speaker 2: overwritten by new data.
15:43
Speaker 1: And because she did it right as they were searching
15:45
Speaker 1: the house.
15:45
Speaker 2: Exactly, because the police sees the phone immediately after the reset,
15:50
Speaker 2: forensic technicians were able to use specialized extraction software to
15:53
Speaker 2: rebuild that index and recover her hidden communications.
15:57
Speaker 1: And what they recovered from the ashes of that deleted
15:59
Speaker 1: phone was her secret life.
16:01
Speaker 2: It was they found a private Facebook friend group where
16:04
Speaker 2: the mask of the loving, supportive mother entirely slipped.
16:09
Speaker 1: What kind of stuff was she saying?
16:10
Speaker 2: Well, we have the quotes from the recovered data. She
16:13
Speaker 2: was sending enraged, vitriolic texts to this group, calling Simon's
16:17
Speaker 2: behavior quote unconscionable.
16:20
Speaker 1: And she called him a deadbeat too, didn't she?
16:22
Speaker 2: Yes, a quote deadbeat? And her fury wasn't just directed
16:25
Speaker 2: at him, It was directed heavily at his parents, Gail and.
16:29
Speaker 1: Dawn, because they wouldn't take her side.
16:32
Speaker 2: Right they refused to take your side and mediate the
16:35
Speaker 2: financial disputes she was having with Simon. She literally wrote
16:38
Speaker 2: to her friends, quote, I want nothing to do with them.
16:41
Speaker 1: And the timeline of these messages aligns perfectly with a
16:43
Speaker 1: massive financial threat, right it does.
16:46
Speaker 2: See, Aaron came from money, She had significant inheritances, and
16:50
Speaker 2: in twenty twenty two, Simon's accountant checked the box for
16:54
Speaker 2: separated on their joint taxes, so.
16:55
Speaker 1: That made it official on paper.
16:57
Speaker 2: Exactly this simple legal change in taxi filing threatened to
17:00
Speaker 2: expose and entangle Aaron's finances in a costly divorced settlement.
17:04
Speaker 1: Okay, I have to push back here, though. Sure you
17:07
Speaker 1: can follow the twisted logic of wanting to harm Simon
17:10
Speaker 1: to protect her money. You can even understand the rage
17:13
Speaker 1: toward his parents, who she felt betrayed her right, But
17:16
Speaker 1: why Ian and Heather? Why murdered the aunt and umpl
17:19
Speaker 1: who literally had nothing to do with her tax filings.
17:22
Speaker 2: This raises an really important question about the psychology of
17:25
Speaker 2: the killer. It speaks to how a consuming narcissistic rage
17:31
Speaker 2: results in terrifying collateral damage.
17:33
Speaker 1: Because Ian himself later testified that the lunch invitation felt
17:37
Speaker 1: completely quote out of the blue. Right.
17:39
Speaker 2: Yeah, they were barely acquaintances at that point, but in
17:42
Speaker 2: Aaron's mind they were part of the broader family structure
17:45
Speaker 2: she was determined to eradicate. If she only poisoned her
17:48
Speaker 2: husband and his parents, the motive would be glaringly obvious.
17:52
Speaker 1: So it's a smoke screen.
17:53
Speaker 2: Precisely, by expanding the kill zone to include the extended family,
17:57
Speaker 2: it looked more like a tragic accident to Aaron. Ian
18:01
Speaker 2: and Heather were just acceptable casualties and the blast radius
18:04
Speaker 2: of her revenge.
18:05
Speaker 1: So armed with this mountain of circumstantial evidence, there recovered
18:09
Speaker 1: text messages, digital forensics placing her at the mushroom sites,
18:13
Speaker 1: the dumped dehydrator, and a clear financial and emotional motive.
18:18
Speaker 2: The prosecution finally brings erin to court.
18:21
Speaker 1: And her desperation leads to a truly unbelievable spectacle.
18:25
Speaker 2: It did. The trial was a massive media event in Australia.
18:29
Speaker 2: Aaron Patterson took the stand in her own defense for
18:33
Speaker 2: eight grueling days.
18:34
Speaker 1: Let's run through her excuses on the stand, because the
18:36
Speaker 1: mental gymnastics are just staggering.
18:38
Speaker 2: They really are.
18:39
Speaker 1: Like the prosecution asks why she made individual Wellington's instead
18:43
Speaker 1: of one large roast, which obviously allowed her to isolate
18:46
Speaker 1: the poison.
18:46
Speaker 2: And her excuse, she claims the store just didn't have
18:49
Speaker 2: a large enough cut of meat.
18:50
Speaker 1: Unbelievable. And what about the mismatched plates because witnesses noted
18:54
Speaker 1: she had an orange plate while everyone else got great plates.
18:57
Speaker 2: She claims it was just a random quirk of her dishwaar.
18:59
Speaker 1: But the most glaring question the prosecution hammered on was
19:03
Speaker 1: why didn't she get sick? She served herself with Wellington
19:06
Speaker 1: too right, right.
19:07
Speaker 2: And this is where she introduces what we can essentially
19:10
Speaker 2: call the cake defense.
19:11
Speaker 1: The cake defense explain that she.
19:14
Speaker 2: Testified that she has suffered from lifelong body image issues
19:17
Speaker 2: and binge eating. She claimed that on the day of
19:20
Speaker 2: the lunch, she gorged on a cake brought by one
19:23
Speaker 2: of the guests, felt intensely sick, and went to the
19:28
Speaker 2: bathroom to throw everything up.
19:30
Speaker 1: So she's saying she conveniently vomited up her portion of
19:34
Speaker 1: the Wellington before the poison could take root.
19:37
Speaker 2: That was her story.
19:38
Speaker 1: It's incredibly convenient. And speaking of convenient bathroom trips, the
19:42
Speaker 1: police confront her with CCTV footage of a ninety minute
19:45
Speaker 1: drive she took with her son.
19:47
Speaker 2: Right. This is on the first day everyone else was
19:49
Speaker 2: in the hospital exactly.
19:50
Speaker 1: Remember, she claimed she was far too sick with diarrhea
19:53
Speaker 1: to drive, which is why she didn't.
19:55
Speaker 2: Visit them, but the footage proves otherwise.
19:57
Speaker 1: Yes, she drives ninety minutes, and the footage shows her
20:00
Speaker 1: stopping at a public bathroom for exactly nine seconds.
20:03
Speaker 2: How does she explain that she claimed she had an accident,
20:06
Speaker 2: pulled over on the side of the road, earlier cleaned
20:09
Speaker 2: herself up with tissues and only went into that public
20:12
Speaker 2: bathroom for nine seconds to throw the soiled tissues in the.
20:16
Speaker 1: Trash, And could her son verify.
20:18
Speaker 2: That No, her own son, who was sitting in the
20:21
Speaker 2: car the entire time, could not verify that story at all.
20:25
Speaker 1: But the moment her entire fabricated reality collapsed like her
20:29
Speaker 1: true Perry Mason moment on the stand was when the
20:32
Speaker 1: prosecution grilled her on the fake cancer diagnosis.
20:36
Speaker 2: Oh, this part is wild.
20:37
Speaker 1: She hasked to explain to the jury why she lied
20:40
Speaker 1: about having cancer to get them to the lunch in
20:42
Speaker 1: the first place.
20:43
Speaker 2: Right, So she testifies that she didn't have cancer, but
20:45
Speaker 2: she was actually planning to get gastric bypass surgery. Gastric bypass, Yeah,
20:50
Speaker 2: she claimed she was deeply embarrassed by this, but knew
20:53
Speaker 2: she'd need her in laws help with the kids during
20:55
Speaker 2: her recovery, so she just made up the cancer story
20:58
Speaker 2: as a more quote social acceptable cover to ask for
21:01
Speaker 2: their support, which.
21:02
Speaker 1: Is just an insane pivot, but that the prosecution doesn't
21:05
Speaker 1: even flinch.
21:06
Speaker 2: Not at all. They simply ask her for the name
21:08
Speaker 2: of the clinic where she had this gastric bypass.
21:10
Speaker 1: Surgery booked and under oath, she names a specific clinic.
21:14
Speaker 2: She does, and the prosecution immediately proves with documentation that
21:19
Speaker 2: the clinic she named does not even offer gastric bypass surgery.
21:22
Speaker 1: It was a complete fabrication, a total lie. My question is,
21:26
Speaker 1: how does someone so meticulous, like someone who tracks rare
21:29
Speaker 1: mushrooms online, drives hours to forage them, buys a dedicated
21:34
Speaker 1: dehydrator and custom bakes a toxic dose into individual pastries,
21:38
Speaker 1: get so unbelievably sloppy on the stand to lie about
21:41
Speaker 1: a clinic that doesn't even perform the procedure.
21:44
Speaker 2: It comes down to a psychological concept called cognitive load.
21:47
Speaker 1: Cognitive load, Yes, the brain has.
21:50
Speaker 2: A limited amount of working memory. Planning a murder and
21:53
Speaker 2: a vacuum is easy. You have months to think through
21:55
Speaker 2: every variable at your own pace. Right, You're not under pressure, exactly,
22:00
Speaker 2: stating a complex, interconnected web of lies. Under the relentless
22:03
Speaker 2: real time pressure of a cross examination that requires immense
22:08
Speaker 2: cognitive effort.
22:09
Speaker 1: You have to keep all the lies straight in your head.
22:11
Speaker 2: Right. When forced to invent fabrications on the spot, like
22:15
Speaker 2: a fake clinic for a fake surgery, the brain simply
22:18
Speaker 2: short circuits. She couldn't process the lies fast enough.
22:21
Speaker 1: And the jury saw right through the shell game.
22:23
Speaker 2: They absolutely did. On July seven, twenty twenty five, after
22:26
Speaker 2: nine weeks of trial and six days of deliberation, they
22:30
Speaker 2: convicted Aaron Patterson of three counts of murder and one
22:33
Speaker 2: count of attempted murder.
22:35
Speaker 1: Wow. So what does this all really mean? When we
22:38
Speaker 1: look back at the core terror of this deep dive?
22:41
Speaker 1: It's how an outwardly devoted mother weaponized patients, digital tools,
22:46
Speaker 1: and a seemingly innocent Sunday roast just to wipe out
22:49
Speaker 1: her own family. It's devastating, and you have to think
22:51
Speaker 1: about the enduring trauma for her children. I mean, they
22:54
Speaker 1: now have to reconcile their entire childhood, their entire history,
22:57
Speaker 1: with the fact that their mother is a mass murder
23:00
Speaker 1: who use them as literal props in her alibi.
23:03
Speaker 2: It leaves us with a deeply unsettling reality to ponder,
23:07
Speaker 2: what's that. Well, a home cooked meal is universally recognized
23:10
Speaker 2: as our most fundamental human expression of safety, nurturing, and love.
23:14
Speaker 1: Yeah, of course, so when a killer.
23:16
Speaker 2: Uses that exact symbol to deliver a lethal dose of betrayal,
23:20
Speaker 2: it forces you to ask a really chilling question, go on,
23:23
Speaker 2: how well do you really know the people pouring your
23:25
Speaker 2: drinks and plating your food, And what unseen, festering resentments
23:30
Speaker 2: might be simmering just beneath the surface of a polite
23:33
Speaker 2: family dinner.
23:34
Speaker 1: Thank you for joining us on this deep dive. Stay curious,