The mushroom poisoning in Vic.... I am gripped - Part 2

[ImustLearn2Cook]

Hi everyone, Aussie Mumsnetter here. As some have requested a new thread be started by an Aussie I decided to do it.

I am still gripped by this case and like many, I am awaiting updates of new information.

Will a matching donor for a liver for Ian be found soon? I hope he makes a full recovery.

Will he be able to shed new light on the lunch they all shared?

And of course is she guilty of deliberately poisoning them or was it an innocent mistake?

I just can't get over the number of lies and inconsistencies in her story...

Gosh, her fancy barrister doesn't have a lot to work with.

I'm invested. She doesn't sound very smart.
For something pre planned, she doesn't appear to have given it much thought. Very inconvenient for her that one lived, or we wouldn't know details about plates etc

I know the prosecution have said that they don’t need a motive to prove it was murder but I really want to know why she did it

That's the only bit that does make sense to me.

She didn't want to share her inherited wealth with soon to be ex husband, so killed off those that he'd inherit from.

And if she was trying to off him too, then she wouldn't have to share at all.

She seems to already have been wealthy tho? Maybe they were just really horrible to her?

Ha, she's not the first (alleged) perp to fall foul of that one. Hard stare at that sorry excuse for a human being Stefan Sterns.

Already wealthy since inheriting a lot of money/ assets from her late DM. I bet the circumstances of her death have been reviewed in light of all this!

Ooohhhh…!

Her mother died of cancer so presumably no foul play there.

Hiding mushrooms in brownies made for her kids. Sheesh.

As an aside. Is the Australian Woolworths the same or totally different to the UK one?

It’s a supermarket, a bit like Tesco but doesn’t do clothes in quite the same way as UK supermarkets.

The evidence about the plates was from Heather Wilkinson’s son. She told him when she was in hospital, before she died. But I assume that’s been corroborated by Ian (who survived).

The lack of motive is the thing that has got me from the beginning too. I mentioned it on the first thread. It doesn’t make sense. If it was the husband, I could understand. Unless she thought he might come back to her in his grief? But that feels like clutching at straws.

Adding to what I’ve said above, the reconciling in grief theory doesn’t hold up, as the husband has said it was Erin who initiated their (multiple) separations.

The evidence about the plates was from Heather Wilkinson’s son.

It was from Simon, who went to see how Ian and Heather were after his parents called him the morning after the lunch and told him they'd called an ambulance. Heather mentioned the plates and how she'd wondered if Erin didn't have much crockery, and mentioned it again as Simon drove them to the hospital as the wait for their ambulance was too long.

I think it was some mad vengeance scheme. Also, it may be she thought Simon's tax form stating he was separated was the start of a 12 month separation being legally noted prior to a divorce, when she may well have lost some of her substantial assets. I've read she inherited 2 million from her grandmother earlier, and also the estates of her parents.

She expected him to bow to her text message manipulation and show up to the lunch, and didn't know until his parents arrived that he was definitely not coming... Then I guess she thought, to hell with it, and carried on. It's hard to get into her mindset.

Yes, I see that from today’s evidence. I thought yesterday’s opening statements said that Heather had talked about the plates to her son, but maybe it was just Simon.

Maybe she wanted to kill Simon to get all the assets, but that doesn’t seem to align with the evidence that she paid for the house he lives in and gave loans to his siblings. And that’s without considering the fact that she was willing to take out four other innocent victims in the process.

None of the theories make sense when you scrutinise them. Or is it just that she’s completely insane?

I’d assume the motive was killing her estranged husband. From the evidence in court it sounds like he pulled out at the last minute. If he’d turned up, he’d probably be dead too and she would hope to have passed it off as an awful accident. The others were just collateral damage. Maybe it wasn’t about money, maybe she’d just realised he wasn’t going to get back with her and she was angry?

From the recently released texts it sounds like he declined the invite last minute, she said to him that she was disappointed and expected/wanted him there at 12:30. So she was still hoping he’d just turn up on the day. I guess by the time she realised he wasn’t going to arrive it was too late to not serve lunch to the rest? Or maybe she just thought well I can’t kill him, but if I kill all his family that’s a punishment for him!

can anyone say what the previous two attempts she made on her husband's life were?

I think there must have been some inkling in the family that she had attempted something deliberate. Why would they pass comment on the plates otherwise? It’s a random thing to bring up.

in also think it’s slightly odd that Simon didn’t contact his parents the evening after the dinner to see how it went? Especially as it was apparently a very rare occurrence and Erin was supposedly sharing important news.

I still think he might be in on it.

Stranger things have happened…

But she was the one to initiate the separation and his evidence indicates that it was him wanting to reconcile, not her.

When the police were gathering evidence (not long after the deaths), it was revealed that at least twice Simon had been admitted to hospital with strange symptoms that may have been a result of poisoning (not sure if mushroom poisoning).

It seems there wasn't enough strong evidence, because those charges have been dropped.

She sounds to have been somehow disturbed or unhappy then…? Suffocating in a small town ? judgmental relatives ? All hard to say without knowing her.

Just joining because I'm following this from the UK - avidly reading the updates every morning.

I agree it’s possible. From evidence reports it sounds almost like he’s making excuses for her