BLOKES THREAD-aimed at blokes-shielas welcome.

[serendipityricho]

Seems to be a lack of threads for blokes.
On other threads,some ladies have mentioned, their OHs
would post, but had no interest in most of the threads on offer.
I can bump this thead twice a day,so its easy to find.
Give it a go---Richo.

[countessalmirena]

springyzone, I think Ms Patterson is intelligent… but she’s not (in my opinion) a mastermind by any means. I suspect she has some sort of tunnel vision whereby she sees how something she had planned would go a certain way, and when it doesn’t proceed as she planned, she is left floundering.

It’s obvious by now that I do think she planned and carried out the murders. I do think she expected the death caps wouldn’t be detected in her victims. I can understand that. Death caps have delayed onset of any symptoms, and the symptoms that do show are not specific and would generally be looked at as gastric upset. By the time the organs show unmistakable signs of shutting down, it’s almost certainly too late to do anything.

Another thing is that research may not have shown Ms Patterson that blood tests and urine tests can show amatoxins if samples are taken early enough and tested for those toxins before they dissipate. (Esp. in the urine - detectable up to 4 days after ingestion.) BUT… it’s also complicated by the Austin Hospital not having any specific test for death cap poisoning (samples had to be sent to a laboratory), so at the time, death cap poisoning was diagnosed by inference because all other causes were ruled out. In my opinion, Erin Patterson felt that no one was going to suspect Amanita poisoning. She felt safe. 

For Gail and Heather, any amatoxins weren’t detectable. It was just too late. The two women were the first to die - Gail, then Heather. Don’s sample showed positive for amatoxins, and so did Ian’s.

Very distressing. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-05-23/erin-patterson-mushroom-murder-trial-live-blog-may-23/1053275...

So… there it is. I think Erin Patterson expected it all to be down to some sort of gastric upset, impossible to diagnose or confirm. When Dr Chris Webster (Leongatha Hospital) started talking to her about death caps on the Monday, 31 July, just 2 days after the lunch, it caught her completely off guard - in my opinion. Death cap mushroom poisoning was suspected (but not confirmed) as early as the previous night.

❝Taking the witness stand on Wednesday, Dr Webster said he told Ms Patterson there was a concern about death cap mushroom poisoning and questioned where she had acquired the mushrooms for the lunch.

“Woolworths,” he said she replied.

“It was a single word response: ‘Woolworths’.”

Dr Webster said he impressed upon Ms Patterson the need for immediate treatment but, after leaving her with a nurse for triage, she checked out against medical advice. 

“I was surprised,” he said.

“I had just informed her she’d been potentially exposed to a deadly death cap mushroom poisoning and I would have thought being in hospital was the best place to be.”

Dr Webster said he rang the phone number Ms Patterson supplied three times, before contacting police.

The jury was played a recording of the triple-0 phone call which commenced at 9.25am on Monday, July 31. 

“This is Dr Chris Webster calling from Leongatha Hospital. I have a concern regarding a patient that presented here earlier that has left the building and is potentially exposed to a fatal toxin,” he said. “There were five people who ate a meal, two of them are in intensive care at Dandenong Hospital, two have been transferred to Dandenong Hospital.”

Dr Webster said he gave police Ms Patterson’s home address but she returned to hospital at 9.48am. 

He told the court Ms Patterson had told him her children ate leftovers with the mushroom and pastry scraped off, and he urged her to get them assessed.

“She expressed reluctance … she was concerned they would be frightened,” he said. 

“I said they can be scared and alive or dead.”❞

[springyzone]

I think you're right, 100% right.

It has struck me all along that she seems to have panicked once the mushrooms came into play.

Perhaps it is tunnel vision, as you say. All I know is if I tried to poison anyone this way, even if the research said the toxin may not be detectable after a period of time, I'd still expect medical staff to question me about the meal and that mushroom poisoning would at least be considered.

This woman didn't get her act together at all.

I wonder, did the doctor in fact say to her-the death cap mushroom could be fatal,you may feel okay but your organs may be shutting down, we need to do tests on you without delay, or did he just say-you may have been exposed to death cap mushrooms.

I still think she's guilty but I have found with some doctors over and over that they say one thing and they know the complications/implications but seem to expect patients to know as well.

But having said that, yes, I find it very strange she wasn't willing to bring in her kids. That to me is one of the biggest tells. An innocent person would be bringing them in immediately. Those kids never had any beef wellington & she knew it. They may have had a slice of beef but it was never near a mushroom.

My son is in the police force and said most criminals are not very bright. I guess the masterminds, we never hear of, do we! They probably get away with it.

[springyzone]

On a different note. School holidays! Yay!

[countessalmirena]

Well, the doctor’s testimony is that he informed her that ❝she'd been exposed to a potentially deadly dose of death cap mushrooms.❞

Additionally ❝Dr Webster says he rang Erin Patterson's phone three times and left three messages after she left the hospital and in the last message said he would have to contact police “for her health and safety”.❞

If she hadn’t taken in the words “potentially deadly”, the urgent phone calls and the warning that the doctor was going to call the police for the sake of her health can’t have been misunderstood.

By the way, Erin Patterson had searched online re death cap mushrooms. That search data was recovered from one of her devices.

[springyzone]

Yes, she was a strange one.

I wonder what spooked her to take off home as quickly as she did.

Maybe she thought-dehydrator, got to ditch it asap, they are on to me.

As for the search record on her phone, another example of very poor planning and execution.

I love adventure/mystery fiction, so I am used to higher standards of criminal cunning, I guess.

[domino-710]

Well - I've looked at ' both sides now ' - 🎶 - and have made my ' judgement '.

I honestly hope she is found guilty.

We'll see.

[countessalmirena]

Justice Beale has finished giving his final instructions to the jury.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-06-30/erin-patterson-mushroom-murder-trial-live-blog-monday-june-30...

Well… the jury will deliberate; I don’t doubt that it will be a difficult talk as they consider the enormous wealth of (and often quite technical) evidence.

🍄🍄‍🟫🍽️🤮🚽🏥🚑🩺⚕️🤥⚖️

[springyzone]

I think she's guilty, but there is one section I find amazing in that link.

Justice Beale says it was Ian Wilkinson's evidence that Heather Wilkinson and Gail Patterson each took two plates to the table and that Erin took her own.

Mr Wilkinson agreed there was no direction on who should take which plate, and that Erin finished the gravy while the others took their plates, the judge says.

He says Erin agreed with that evidence.

In other words, Heather and Gail could potentially have picked up Erin's plate.  Or did Erin tuck hers away in a hard to get to spot. I'd have been asking Ian W more about the plate placement.

I wonder what Erin would have done had someone picked up 'her' plate to take and left a poisonous one behind. Is this what the spare wellington was for, to do a switch?

I haven't read any comments on the internet by anyone where they think she's innocent. Quite the opposite.

[countessalmirena]

Yes, that needs to be taken into consideration.

Isn Wilkinson’s evidence is clear; he said Heather wanted to explore Erin’s pantry because Heather and Don were planning on their own new pantry. Heather called to Gail to come and gave a look at the pantry. Ian saw Erin looking distinctly reluctant and he remembered thinking that perhaps the pantry was a bit messy and that’s why Erin didn’t want anyone looking, so he backed away and didn’t join the ladies looking as he didn’t want to upset her.

The food was being served / plated on the kitchen island bench. Erin refused any help with plating up (and both Heather and Gail offered), but Heather and Gail picked up their plates and carried them to the table. Heather distinctly mentioned that Erin’s plate was a different colour; it was Ian’s testimony that Erin “served herself” on a different plate, so I conclude she had her plate already allocated to her. It’s Erin’s testimony that she said something like “Grab a plate, guys” while she quickly mixed together a gravy from a sachet. It seems (but I wish this had been clarified) that the large plates were set out ready for the guests to take through, but that Erin had her plate separate, beside her, while she mixed the gravy.

Assuming that this is the case, it wouldn’t have mattered which of the large plates were taken by Heather and Gail for themselves or for the men. If they were all poisoned, it’s wellington roulette with four bullets and four shots, and the blank was with Erin’s plate still in the kitchen area, safely claimed by her.

She must have had some way of identifying the unlaced beef wellington before plating up, though. The six beef wellington “parcels” were already out of the oven and resting by the time the guests arrived. I find this a little suspicious, as someone who enjoys cooking for family and friends / guests. I would only let the beef wellington rest for about 15 minutes once guests had arrived. (I’d also prepare the beef wellington the night before, rather than the morning of.)

Having taken the beef wellingtons out of the oven already means the guests wouldn’t know how the individual beef wellingtons were cooked / arranged on baking trays. If she’s guilty, she almost certainly had the innocent beef wellington completely separate. Three separate baking trays? Or would she fit five of them onto one tray?

Terrifying thought for Simon: she actually did make six beef wellingtons even though her told her the day before that he felt uncomfortable about coming to the lunch. It is plausible that up until the actual moment of her guests striving, she thought he might still come and wanted his deadly serving to be ready and waiting for him. This is the scenario if she did indeed plan murder.

[domino-710]

Crikey - looks like we are in for a rough night.

Has been pouring all day - and predicted to get worse overnight - winds & flash flooding.

Stay safe NSW.