An Australian woman accused of murdering three people with a toxic mushroom-laced Beef Wellington faces trial on Wednesday in a case that has grabbed global attention.
Erin Patterson, 50, is charged with three murders — including both of her parents-in-law — and one attempted murder.
She has pleaded not guilty to all counts.
Patterson is accused of hosting a July 2023 lunch at which she served the baked pastry-and-beef dish, which police said was laced with poisonous mushrooms.
Her estranged parents-in-law, Don and Gail Patterson, and a local pastor’s wife, Heather Wilkinson, died in the days after the meal.
Wilkinson’s husband Ian recovered after nearly two months in hospital. The BBC had reported during his hospitalization that he was waiting on a liver transplant.
Patterson was arrested in November 2023, the BBC reported.
James Ross/AAP Image via AP 
Patterson will be tried in the Latrobe Valley Law Courts in Morwell, south of Melbourne — about an hour’s drive from Leongatha, where the allegedly fatal meal was eaten.
A jury of 15 people was selected on Tuesday and will be whittled down to 12 via ballot as the verdict nears.
Justice Christopher Beale told the jurors that prosecutors had dropped separate charges against Patterson alleging she had also attempted to murder her estranged husband.
Justice Beale urged the jury to “dispassionately” weigh the evidence in the case, using their heads and not their hearts, the BBC reported.
The trial is expected to run for six weeks and will begin with opening statements from the prosecution and defense, each side giving a summary of their case and detailing the witnesses and evidence they plan to rely on.
The case made headlines worldwide, sparking a string of podcasts and a television documentary series on Australian streaming service Stan.
Anita Lester /AAP image via AP 
Victoria state’s Supreme Court has imposed strict guidelines on reporting about the case to ensure Patterson receives a fair trial.
While the court is open to the public, the case will not be televised.
What are death cap mushrooms?
Police say the symptoms of the four sickened family members were consistent with poisoning from wild amanita phalloides, known as death cap mushrooms.
Death cap mushrooms sprout freely throughout wet, warm parts of Australia and are easily mistaken for edible varieties.
They reportedly taste sweeter than other types of mushrooms but possess potent toxins that slowly poison the liver and kidneys.
Death caps are responsible for 90% of lethal mushroom poisoning globally, the BBC reported. In 2020, a spate of poisonings in Victoria killed one person and hospitalized seven others.
The Australian Broadcasting Corp. reported that Erin Patterson had written in a statement that she had cooked a Beef Wellington steak dish for the lunch using mushrooms bought from a major supermarket chain and dried mushrooms from an Asian grocery store.
She wrote that she had also eaten the meal and later suffered stomach pains and diarrhea.
Her children, who were not present at the lunch, ate some of the leftover Beef Wellington the next day, the BBC reported. However the mushrooms had been scraped off the dish as they do not like them, she said.
