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‘A colossal failure’: Erin Patterson’s bid for a fresh trial · The Front

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: From the Australian. Here's what's on the front. I'm Claire Harvey.
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  Speaker 1: It's Thursday, August twenty twenty twenty six. Car windows smashed
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  Speaker 1: and vile abuse in the street. That's what anti Israel
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  Speaker 1: activists did to Marcia Langton, one of Australia's most respected
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  Speaker 1: Aboriginal elders. Langton, who is seventy four, told the Royal
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: Commission into Anti Semitism and Social Cohesion there were strong
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  Speaker 1: parallels between the racist myths and lies that fueled bigotry
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  Speaker 1: against Indigenous people and Jews. Our coverage of the Royal
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  Speaker 1: Commission is unrivaled and live now at the Australian dot
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  Speaker 1: com au. A colossal failure and a catastrophic miscarriage of justice.
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  Speaker 1: That's the claim from Mushroom murderer Aaron Patterson's lawyers as
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  Speaker 1: she launchers a bid to get out of jail today
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  Speaker 1: v Appeal and how the Crown is trying to sure
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  Speaker 1: Patterson is put away for even longer.
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  Speaker 2: For over a century, courts have unashamedly applied the fundamental
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  Speaker 2: principle that justice should not only be done, but should
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  Speaker 2: manifestly and undoubtedly be seen to be done.
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  Speaker 1: This is a voice actor reading the submissions prepared by
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  Speaker 1: lawyers for triple murderer Aaron Patterson. She's serving a minimum
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  Speaker 1: thirty three year jail term for killing three elderly relatives
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  Speaker 1: and attempting to murder a fourth with a beef Wellington
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  Speaker 1: laced with deathcap mushrooms.
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  Speaker 2: What occurred here was a colossal failure.
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  Speaker 1: Patterson's appealing her convictions and the first ground. The colossal
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  Speaker 1: failure is something that was revealed while the jury was
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  Speaker 1: deliberating in late June and early July of twenty twenty
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  Speaker 1: five in the Victorian country town of Morwell, a small
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  Speaker 1: place and with the local hotels and motels booked out
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  Speaker 1: with journo's lawyers and cops. The trial judge became aware
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  Speaker 1: that the jury was staying in the same hotel as
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  Speaker 1: some of the Crown lawyers and detective Leading Senior Constable
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  Speaker 1: Stephen Eppingstall. He was known as the informant in the case.
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  Speaker 2: The only proper remedy is the quashing of her convictions
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  Speaker 2: and an order for a retrial.
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  Speaker 1: On Wednesday, an appeal hearing kicked off before three judges
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  Speaker 1: in Melbourne and Barrister Richard Edney, acting for Patterson told
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  Speaker 1: the court the accommodation situation meant the jury's verdict was unsafe,
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  Speaker 1: even though he said he knew of no evidence that
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  Speaker 1: any juror had communicated with or even seen the policeman
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  Speaker 1: or the lawyers. Justice Peter Kidd was asking Edney questions,
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  Speaker 1: we've voice acted their exchange.
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  Speaker 2: Mister Edney, if they did view or see the practitioners,
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  Speaker 2: so what Well, in our submission it matters that they
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  Speaker 2: had the opportunity to see participants from one side of
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  Speaker 2: the case. That's important. There's an important aspect to that. Well.
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  Speaker 2: Why Well, on this case it was eleven weeks the
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  Speaker 2: trial went for. The jury would have.
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  Speaker 1: Been aware of The Australian's senior audio producer, Christen Amiot,
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  Speaker 1: has been covering this case since the beginning. I asked
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  Speaker 1: Chrissy how Richard Edney's argument adds up given that the
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  Speaker 1: jurors were being supervised by court officials the whole time.
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  Speaker 3: He suggested on Wednesday, in his comments to the Court
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  Speaker 3: that even though the jury were under the supervision of
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  Speaker 3: people who are very mysteriously known as jury keepers, court officials,
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  Speaker 3: court officials exactly that those court officials didn't enter into
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  Speaker 3: the hotel rooms of the jurors at the time, and
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  Speaker 3: that their hotel rooms did have windows, and so there's
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  Speaker 3: a possibility that they might have But yes, they are
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  Speaker 3: suggesting that because there is no evidence to show that
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  Speaker 3: contact didn't happen, that an injustice has occurred.
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  Speaker 1: It kind of brings to mind this ridiculous proposition that
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  Speaker 1: the detective or the lawyers would have been standing in
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  Speaker 1: the garden waving up at the windows, going she's guilty. Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: I mean, it seems pretty far fetched to me. What
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  Speaker 1: was your take listening to it?
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  Speaker 3: I agree in that if anybody knows that justice needs
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  Speaker 3: to be seen to be done, it's going to be
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  Speaker 3: the Crown prosecutor and their associates and the detective who
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  Speaker 3: has brought this case to trial, who's built the case
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  Speaker 3: to come to trial.
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  Speaker 1: The second ground of Patterson's appeal is that the trial
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  Speaker 1: judge made a mistake by allowing evidence to be presented
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  Speaker 1: to the jury about two connected things. One was posts
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  Speaker 1: on a website called eye Naturalist, where kind of biology
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  Speaker 1: geeks post sightings of things that they've seen a rare
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  Speaker 1: tree or a butterfly or in this case, mushrooms, deathcat
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  Speaker 1: mushrooms and cell tower evidence about Aaron Patterson's phone allegedly
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  Speaker 1: pinging off towers near the locations where these deathcat mushrooms
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  Speaker 1: had been spotted. The Crown in the trial used this
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  Speaker 1: to suggest to the jury that Aaron Patterson had seen
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  Speaker 1: the posts on Our Naturalists and then had kind of
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  Speaker 1: rushed out there to pick the mushrooms and then had
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  Speaker 1: subsequently served them to these people to her family members
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  Speaker 1: at the meal. Aaron Patterson denied that completely. Why is
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  Speaker 1: this a ground of appeal?
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  Speaker 3: The defense in the appeal says that this evidence just
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  Speaker 3: wasn't relevant because there is no evidence to suggest that
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  Speaker 3: Aaron Patterson actually looked at those posts on the OI
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  Speaker 3: Naturalist website or travel to those areas.
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  Speaker 1: Our Naturalist was a really big part of the trial
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  Speaker 1: because there was evidence of Aaron Patterson having been interested
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  Speaker 1: in NI Naturalists, but it was difficult for the Crown
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  Speaker 1: to present evidence of exactly what she looked at because
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  Speaker 1: one of her phones had gone missing and wasn't able
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  Speaker 1: to be located at all. There was a huge amount
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  Speaker 1: of evidence in discussion about that exactly.
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  Speaker 3: So they're saying it's a pretty long bow to draw,
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  Speaker 3: and that the jury might have been led by the
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  Speaker 3: prosecution to interpret that in any other way than it's
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  Speaker 3: a coincidence that she happened to like this website.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, ground four is a lot simpler. This is about
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  Speaker 1: whether or not the jury should have been made a
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  Speaker 1: where are Facebook posts between Aaron Patterson and some friends
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  Speaker 1: that she'd made in true crime groups actually about her family?
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  Speaker 1: Aaron had told these Facebook friends a lot about what
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  Speaker 1: was going on in the family as she split up
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  Speaker 1: slowly from Simon Patterson, and expressed in a number of
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  Speaker 1: posts her frustration with his family members. A lot of
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  Speaker 1: it related to money, whether she was applying for child
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  Speaker 1: support or not. What's her counsel, the applicant's counsel saying
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  Speaker 1: about that?
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  Speaker 3: Now Pattison's lawyers are saying that actually those messages aren't
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  Speaker 3: relevant at all, or that they don't have the value,
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  Speaker 3: the probative value to build a case against her in
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  Speaker 3: this instance, said these messages were sent and received by
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  Speaker 3: Aaron Patterson's online friends at a time when she was
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  Speaker 3: separating from Simon Patterson. It came about because she discovered
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  Speaker 3: that Simon had listed himself as separated on a tax return,
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  Speaker 3: and then she said well, now I'm within my rights
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  Speaker 3: to claim child support from you. That kicked off this
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  Speaker 3: conversation about the money, and Simon's parents had suggested that
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  Speaker 3: maybe just getting together and having a conversation about this
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  Speaker 3: would be better for everybody, and especially the children, but
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  Speaker 3: she was resistant for that idea and said some pretty
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  Speaker 3: nasty things about them.
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  Speaker 1: We've used a voice actor to read the Facebook messages
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  Speaker 1: extracted from Aaron Patterson's phone as they were read to
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  Speaker 1: the jury in her trial.
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  Speaker 4: Don said they can't adjudicate if they don't know both sides,
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  Speaker 4: and Simon won't give his side, so he said all
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  Speaker 4: he can ask is that Simon and I get together
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  Speaker 4: and pray for the children. This family, I swear to
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  Speaker 4: fucking God, nobody bloody listened to me. At least they
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  Speaker 4: know they're a lost cause. I'm sick of this shit.
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  Speaker 4: I want nothing to do with them, so fuck them.
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  Speaker 4: His mum was horrified I had claimed child support. Why
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  Speaker 4: isn't she horrified her son is such a deadbeat that
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  Speaker 4: I had no choice but to claim.
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  Speaker 1: Now, when you're on trial for murdering them, that looks
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  Speaker 1: pretty damning exactly. But what the Council for Patterson is
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  Speaker 1: saying is that. Well, the prosecution explicitly said they were
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  Speaker 1: not going to claim that hatred of the Pattersons was
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  Speaker 1: her motive. In fact, what the Crown said in the
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  Speaker 1: trial was that they weren't going to put a motive
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  Speaker 1: at all. They weren't going to try and persuade the
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  Speaker 1: jury of a motive at all. All they had to
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  Speaker 1: do was persuade the jury beyond reasonable doubt that Aaron
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  Speaker 1: Patterson did knowingly serve these deathcat mushrooms in the attempt
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  Speaker 1: to kill them. So the lawyers now are saying, well,
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  Speaker 1: you put these messages which are so damning, and that
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  Speaker 1: is effectively you might as well have put them as
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  Speaker 1: a motive. But she didn't get the opportunity to answer
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  Speaker 1: that properly. I mean, we both covered the trial. They
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  Speaker 1: were pretty this is a pindrop moment, wasn't it? When
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  Speaker 1: these Facebook messages were read to the jury.
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  Speaker 3: It was. And not only that, it also appeared to
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  Speaker 3: contradict something that Aaron herself had touched on in her
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  Speaker 3: evidence in chief, which was that she was a person
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  Speaker 3: of faith, that she felt at home in the Patterson
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  Speaker 3: family because of their connection to the church.
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  Speaker 1: And that she had a warm and loving relationship with
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  Speaker 1: all these.
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  Speaker 3: People exactly, and then to sort of say, you know,
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  Speaker 3: they want us to go and pray over it. What idiots?
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  Speaker 3: It doesn't look good.
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  Speaker 1: Coming up. Why the Crown wants Patterson's non parole period increased? Now,
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  Speaker 1: Grandfather of the appeal is something that I think any
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  Speaker 1: convicted person would probably bring in as a ground. This
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  Speaker 1: is that the cross examination was a pre and unfair.
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  Speaker 1: The crown prosecutor lead crown prosecutor at trial was doctor
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  Speaker 1: Nanette Rogers. She's the silk, and she did aggressively cross
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  Speaker 1: examine Aaron Patterson.
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  Speaker 2: There was undisputed evidence that was effectively repeated at length,
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  Speaker 2: and what occurred effectively was a rehashing of the prosecution case.
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  Speaker 2: In our submission that caused an unfairness at this trial.
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  Speaker 1: The dynamic in that courtroom when Patterson was giving evidence
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  Speaker 1: was so interesting, wasn't it. You know, she really thought, Patterson,
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  Speaker 1: you could tell she thought she was the smartest person
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  Speaker 1: in the room, and she decided to give evidence something
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  Speaker 1: she didn't have to do. That's right.
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  Speaker 3: Most defense barristers will recommend their clients don't give evidence
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  Speaker 3: in their own defense purely because it opens them up
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  Speaker 3: to a cross examination by somebody like Nanette Rogers, who
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  Speaker 3: is a very experienced prosecutor.
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  Speaker 1: One interesting point that the appeal judges were putting to
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  Speaker 1: the Patterson lawyers now is, well, Colin Mandyasi, who was
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  Speaker 1: the defense counsel at the trial, he didn't object to
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: any of this, or if he did, it was resolved
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  Speaker 1: in the moment, you know, he didn't then make an
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  Speaker 1: application to the judge the jury should be dismissed and
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  Speaker 1: we should start again, because this is so unfair, that's right.
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  Speaker 3: And they touched upon an instance where Colin Mandy was
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  Speaker 3: given by Justice Christopher Biale time to think about if
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  Speaker 3: he wanted to make such an application overnight, and he
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  Speaker 3: came back and ultimately didn't take him up on that offer,
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  Speaker 3: and so the trial proceeded as was planned.
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  Speaker 1: The sixth ground is that Nanett Rodgers's closing address was
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  Speaker 1: also unfair to wear In Patterson, because, just like in
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  Speaker 1: the cross examination, the lawyers for Patterson are now saying
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  Speaker 1: that Nanett Rodgers raised all sorts of things that weren't
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  Speaker 1: fairly included in the opening address, for example, or that
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: were prejudicial to Patterson, and that she didn't get a
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: proper opportunity to respond to them. One of those things
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  Speaker 1: was whether or not she had a friendly relationship with
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  Speaker 1: the elderly relatives and regularly had them over to lunch.
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: Another was how sick she was after the lunch herself.
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  Speaker 1: This was really intriguing at trial, wasn't it. Aaron Patterson
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  Speaker 1: claimed that she was herself quite unwell after the lunch,
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  Speaker 1: but she certainly wasn't admitted to hospital, it wasn't in
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: intensive care like everybody else.
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  Speaker 3: And also this was at the point during the trial,
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  Speaker 3: during Aaron Patterson's own evidence that she introduced actually a
• 12:22
  Speaker 3: new idea, which was that she had an eating disorder
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  Speaker 3: that caused her after the lunch to eat the dessert
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  Speaker 3: that was left there and then to throw up, and
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  Speaker 3: that perhaps the fact that she had thrown up meant
• 12:33
  Speaker 3: that her own symptoms were significantly reduced because the poison
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  Speaker 3: from the death cat mushrooms wasn't able to enter her
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  Speaker 3: system in the same way.
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  Speaker 1: And that relates to ground seven to io, which is
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  Speaker 1: all about motive. Patterson is now saying it's unfair that
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  Speaker 1: the Crown's closing address implied there was a motive for
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  Speaker 1: murder the family unhappiness, even though in its opening address
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  Speaker 1: the Crown said it wasn't going to put a motive
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  Speaker 1: at all. So Patterson now says she didn't get the
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  Speaker 1: opportunity to answer this question of whether her feelings about
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: the Pattersons were a motive to kill them. And this
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: is an intriguing case. I haven't covered a murder case
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  Speaker 1: before when no motive is put to the jury. That
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: was obviously a tactical decision made by the Crown. It's
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: now one of Patterson's grounds for appeal. But the next
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: part of the appeal hearing that we're going to have
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  Speaker 1: on Thursday is the Crown appealing against the adequacy of
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: this sentence.
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  Speaker 3: Aaron Patterson was given three life sentences for the murders
• 13:41
  Speaker 3: of Don Gale and Heather and a twenty five year
• 13:44
  Speaker 3: sentence for the attempted murder of Ian Wilkinson, who was,
• 13:47
  Speaker 3: as we said, the sole survivor of the lunch. And
• 13:50
  Speaker 3: under Victorian law, when the maximum sentence is given for
• 13:53
  Speaker 3: either of those crimes, which are very serious crimes, the
• 13:56
  Speaker 3: sentencing judge must give a non parole period, so Aaron
• 14:00
  Speaker 3: Patterson will be in her early eighties before she is
• 14:03
  Speaker 3: eligible for parole. Justice Bille in sentencing Aaron Patterson said
• 14:07
  Speaker 3: that she will probably spend a large chunk of her
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  Speaker 3: time in prison in solitary confinement. She's already serving that
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  Speaker 3: sentence in a very tough women's prison, and he said
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  Speaker 3: so that was kind of part of his rationale for
• 14:21
  Speaker 3: fixing that non parole period of thirty three years. The
• 14:24
  Speaker 3: Crown says, actually, if you're going to murder three people
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  Speaker 3: an attempt to murder a fourth, then thirty three years
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  Speaker 3: actually doesn't cut it.
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  Speaker 1: I've got to say I agree. I mean, if you
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: think about Aaron Patterson as a domestic violence murderer, which
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: is what I think she is, you know, this is
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: a crime just like the men who we see, you know,
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: setting their families on fire or killing their children with
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: gun I think one of the issues with this case
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  Speaker 1: is that it's been interpreted as kind of a quirky
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: country murder mystery, like an episode of some BBC drama,
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  Speaker 1: rather than being about the very serious brutal murders of innocent,
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: trusting people. The risk for the Crown with appealing on
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: a sentence is that it gets reduced.
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  Speaker 3: As a society, we have all agreed that the punishment
• 15:10
  Speaker 3: for a crime of this nature is imprisonment, often for
• 15:13
  Speaker 3: a very very long time. And if you don't want
• 15:16
  Speaker 3: to serve a large chunk of your life in solitary
• 15:19
  Speaker 3: confinement or in a prison, don't premeditate to kill four people.
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  Speaker 1: Thanks Chrissy, Thank you. Kristin Amiot is the producer of
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: the front. We'll be covering the rest of the appeal
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: live at the Australian dot com dot au