Erin Patterson is set to spend the rest of her life behind bars after her bid to overturn her convictions failed and prosecutors succeeded in having her non-parole period removed.
On Friday, Supreme Court of Victoria appeal judges Justices Stephen McLeish, Lesley Taylor and Peter Kidd dismissed Patterson’s appeal.
Supreme Court of Victoria Justice Christopher Beale sentenced Patterson to life in prison on September 8, 2025, after she was convicted of murdering Don and Gail Patterson and Gail’s sister, Heather Wilkinson, by serving them a poisonous beef Wellington.
Justice Beale had originally set a 33-year non-parole period. However, the prosecution successfully appealed the sentence, and the appeal judges ordered that Patterson serve life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Patterson appeared by video link wearing a blue prison-issued jumper, glasses and her long brown hair tied in a ponytail. She showed no emotion as the judgment was delivered.
Her lawyers have indicated that she will seek leave to appeal to the High Court, the final legal avenue available to challenge her convictions and sentence.
Patterson’s victims died after eating death cap mushrooms served in beef Wellingtons during lunch at her Leongatha home on July 29, 2023.
Pastor Ian Wilkinson, who was not present in court on Friday, survived after becoming critically ill. Patterson was also convicted of his attempted murder.
Erin Patterson is likely to spend the rest of her life behind bars after her appeal failed
Patterson challenged her murder convictions on seven grounds, arguing that several errors had resulted in a substantial miscarriage of justice and that the convictions should be set aside.
Much of the appeal centred on her claim that a “fundamental irregularity” occurred when the jury was housed in the same hotel as police and prosecutors during deliberations. She argued the arrangement may have compromised the verdicts, but the judges found there was “no basis” for that ground.
The courtroom was filled with true crime enthusiasts, journalists and Matthew, the brother of Simon Patterson.
The brief hearing was livestreamed on the court’s website, while a television crew was permitted inside to record the latest stage of Patterson’s legal battle.
The ruling makes Patterson only the second woman in Australian history to receive a sentence of life without parole.
Katherine Knight became the first in 2001 after stabbing her partner, John Price, to death, skinning his body and cooking his head with the intention of feeding it to his children.
Reading the judgment, Justice McLeish said it was “inappropriate” for Justice Beale to set a non-parole period when sentencing Patterson last year.
Patterson also argued that some evidence should not have been admitted, while other material was wrongly excluded. The disputed evidence included mobile phone tower data connected to sightings of death cap mushrooms, Facebook messages, testimony from “friends” and photographs and videos of mushrooms found on an SD card that could have supported her claims about foraging.
Don and Gail Patterson were killed by Erin Patterson
Heather Wilkinson was also murdered after the fatal lunch
Victoria’s Director of Public Prosecutions, Brendan Kissane KC, leaves court on Friday after securing Patterson’s life sentence without parole
She further claimed that the prosecution’s lengthy cross-examination had been “unfair and oppressive”. Patterson also alleged that the prosecutor’s closing address contained numerous errors and misstatements and suggested she had a motive to kill.
Patterson will now be returned to the Dame Phyllis Frost Centre, where she is expected to spend decades in custody.
Because of the notoriety of her crimes and the hostility toward her inside the prison, she is held in near-solitary confinement in the restrictive Gordon Unit.
She spends up to 23 hours a day occupying herself with crocheting, watching television, using a computer and reading books or magazines.
Confined to a small cell with a tiny attached courtyard, Patterson receives food and medication through a slot in the door. She has almost no contact with other inmates and requires two officers to escort her during any limited movement around the prison.
The restrictions have been imposed for her own protection because of the public attention surrounding her crimes.
The conclusion of the lengthy legal process may now offer some measure of closure to the surviving victims.
Detective Sen-Constable Laura Colley, the officer who arrested Patterson, beamed as the decision was handed down.
Ian Wilkinson attended almost every day of Patterson’s ten-week trial in Morwell last year and was also present for her appeal hearing in August.
During a pre-sentence hearing, Wilkinson condemned Patterson’s “callous and calculated disregard” for people who had shown her only good intentions. He also questioned the “foolishness” of believing murder could solve problems.
Black plastic was erected outside Patterson’s home to shield her from the media when she was expected to return in July last year
Patterson at the end of her interview with Detective Leading Senior Constable Stephen Eppingstall
Wilkinson carefully limited his offer of forgiveness during that hearing, extending it only to the harm done to him and not to the murders of Heather, Gail and Don.
He urged Patterson to accept that offer “with full confession and repentance”. Wilkinson said he bore her no ill will and hoped she would use her time in prison to become a better person.
“I am no longer Erin Patterson’s victim. She has become the victim of my kindness,” he said.
Little has been seen recently of Patterson’s former husband, Simon, who believed she had repeatedly tried to kill him before murdering members of his family.
Mr Patterson alleged that his wife had attempted to poison him several times between 2021 and 2022 with meals she prepared, including a container of penne bolognese, chicken korma during a camping trip, beef stew while he was recovering at her home and a curry wrap on another outing.
He became seriously ill on each occasion and required hospital treatment. One episode left him in a medically induced coma for more than two weeks and led to emergency bowel surgery.
Detective Leading Senior Constable Stephen Eppingstall leaves court on Friday. He made no comment
Detective Sen-Constable Laura Colley, who arrested Patterson, appeared delighted when the decision was delivered
Patterson’s only supporter, Ali Rose Porter, was surrounded by reporters outside court
Police charged Patterson with three counts of attempted murder in relation to those incidents. Investigators also found research on her devices about barium carbonate, a rat poison, around the time of one illness. However, no particular poison was ever confirmed by forensic testing.
The charges were discontinued before the main trial and were never put before a jury.
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In April, it emerged that Mr Patterson had agreed to write a memoir under a publishing deal.
Now that the appeal has concluded, the book is expected to be released.
Patterson had black plastic sheeting installed across the entrance to her Leongatha home to shield her from the media when she was expected to leave court after her trial.
The property will now be taken from her and sold to compensate the victims of her crimes.
Patterson’s alleged attempt to escape justice was ultimately uncovered by Detective Leading Senior Constable Stephen Eppingstall, who formally took over the investigation around August 3, 2023, following the mass poisoning.
Detective Eppingstall attended every day of Patterson’s pre-trial proceedings, trial and appeal.
He maintained a dignified silence as he left court on Friday, in keeping with his respect for the victims whose case he had helped pursue.
Eppingstall is a long-serving and respected member of the force. In 2024, he received a Prince of Wales Award for his service as a Defence Force reservist.
Patterson’s barristers Sophie Stafford and Colin Mandy SC during the lengthy trial in Morwell
Lawyer Bill Doogue had complained that Patterson’s jury was briefly housed alongside police, prosecutors and reporters
He conducted Patterson’s first formal police interview on August 5, 2023. During that interview, she denied owning a dehydrator or foraging for mushrooms.
At trial, Eppingstall gave extensive evidence as the Crown’s final key witness and faced lengthy cross-examination from the defence.
After bringing Patterson to trial, he also recently helped secure justice against the teenage killer responsible for the murder of 16-year-old Oscar Hamilton.
Crown prosecutor Dr Nanette Rogers, who questioned Patterson in the witness box for days, has effectively ended her career as a Victorian prosecutor.
Patterson’s appeal was always facing a difficult path.
The central argument was that the court’s decision to house the jury in the same hotel as police and prosecutors represented a “catastrophic failure”.
During the August hearing, Patterson’s barrister Richard Edney argued that placing the jury in a hotel with journalists, police and prosecutors was unfair.
“We would describe the sequestration and what occurred during it as catastrophic, and in our submission, what has occurred here is that there has been a fundamental failure to comply with the dictum already referred to,” he said.
Simon Patterson has largely disappeared from public view but is expected to publish his memoir now the appeal is over
Pastor Ian Wilkinson told Patterson: “I am no longer Erin Patterson’s victim. She has become the victim of my kindness.”
“So what?” Justice Peter Kidd replied.
Daily Mail reporters from around the world had been staying at the same hotel.
The Age journalist Chris Vedelago later reported that Patterson’s lawyer, Bill Doogue, had complained to the court that a Daily Mail article may have tainted the jury.
“There was also an article published by Our News Outlet that can only be based on discussions with the jurors, either directly or indirectly, including mention of one of the jurors being allowed to watch an AFL game separately with a jury keeper,” Mr Doogue claimed.
His complaint related to a Daily Mail report that the jury had watched the Carlton and Collingwood match after being sequestered. The report came from a source with no connection to the jury.
The jury in the high-profile death cap mushroom murder trial was housed at a hotel in the Morwell area while considering its verdict.
Members of the prosecution team, journalists and a key police witness were also staying there for part of that period.
Director of Public Prosecutions Brendan Kissane KC rejected Richard Edney’s argument during the appeal.
The Patterson trial is expected to be Crown prosecutor Dr Nanette Rogers’ last major case
“Far from being some sort of catastrophic failure, to use the words that Mr Edney used, there’s no evidence in our submission to support this ground,” he said during the August hearing.
Mr Kissane argued that the evidence showed the system had operated as intended.
Mr Edney raised 35 complaints about the prosecution’s closing address at Patterson’s trial.
Patterson had been represented at trial by Colin Mandy SC, who pursued every available avenue in an effort to clear her.
“The defence counsel was very alive to the complaints that you’re now making under ground six. So alive was he to them that he raised most of them in his final address,” Justice Lesley Taylor told Mr Edney.
“When one looks at the final address delivered by a very experienced trial counsel, the complaints that you are now raising, they were on the table at the time.
“Nothing was being overlooked here.”
Mr Kissane argued that Justice Beale should not have set a non-parole period and that Patterson should instead have received life imprisonment without parole.
He submitted that, if a non-parole period was to be imposed, 33 years was manifestly inadequate given the seriousness of the crimes.
Before the appeal ruling, Patterson would have been 81 when she became eligible to apply for parole.
Mr Kissane said Justice Beale’s reliance on prison conditions when setting the 33-year non-parole period was legally and factually flawed.
“If somebody’s in their 80s and commits an offence that requires a significant non-parole period, then the court is sentencing somebody in effect, albeit that they may well impose… a non-parole period by the statute, the court is still in effect sentencing somebody beyond what one would normally expect to be the term of their natural life,” Mr Kissane said.
“It has its harsh aspect about it, of course, but we accept that. But in our submission, that is not a matter that’s outweighed by the seriousness of the offending… that’s a harsh, harsh submission to make.
“But we submit that it’s demanded by the nature of the offending in this case.”
