Mushroom killer accused of ‘tampering with with prison food and making inmate sick’ | News World

An inmate reportedly accused Erin Patterson of tampering together with her food after becoming sick (Pic: AP)

Erin Patterson has been accused of tampering with prison food and making an inmate sick while working within the jail kitchen, it’s reported.

The allegation was allegedly made by the inmate who said they became in poor health after eating the food she prepared at Melbourne’s Dame Phyllis Frost Centre in Australia where she’s being held.

Patterson was found guilty earlier today of three counts of murder and one in every of attempted murder today after serving a beef wellington lunch containing poisonous death cap mushrooms she had foraged.

The inmate says she fell in poor health after having a dispute with Patterson and believes the 50-year-old was in charge, the Herald Sun reports.

Based on a Corrections Victoria source who spoke to the Day by day Mail Australia, Patterson had been given a job within the prison kitchen despite the character of the crime she was charged with.

Her supporters say the inmate’s poisoning accusation is baseless.

Following her conviction on the Supreme Court in Melbourne, Patterson faces life in prison and will probably be sentenced at a later date.

In 2023 the mother-of-two served the individually cooked beef wellingtons at her home in Leongatha to her parents-in-law, Don and Gail Patterson, Gail’s sister Heather Wilkinson and Heather’s husband pastor Ian Wilkinson.

(AUSTRALIA OUT) The Dame Phyllis Frost Centre is a women's correctional centre in Deer Park, Victoria. (Photo by Fairfax Media via Getty Images via Getty Images)
Patterson is believed to have been given a job at Dame Phyllis Frost Centre, where she is being held (Picture: Fairfax Media via Getty Images)

This undated handout photo from the Supreme Court of Victoria released on July 7, 2025 shows an annotated photo of plates containing samples of a beef Wellington meal laced with toxic mushrooms that was prepared by Australian home cook Erin Patterson, during a toxicology analysis at the Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine. An Australian woman murdered her husband's parents and aunt by lacing their beef Wellington lunch with toxic mushrooms, a jury found on July 7 at the climax of a trial watched around the world. Patterson hosted an intimate meal in July 2023 that started with good-natured banter and earnest prayer -- but ended with three guests dead. (Photo by Handout / SUPREME COURT OF VICTORIA / AFP) / RESTRICTED TO EDITORIAL USE - MANDATORY CREDIT
Among the beef Wellington meal laced with toxic mushrooms that was prepared by Patterson (Picture: AFP)

All 4 guests became in poor health, with all but Wilkinson dying.

During a nine-week trial the jury was asked to come to a decision if she knew the lunch contained death caps, and if she intended for her guests to die.

Prosecutors didn’t offer a motive for the killings but had identified strained relations between Patterson and her estranged husband, and frustration that she had felt about his parents previously.

The defence claimed there was no reason why she would need to kill the couples, as she had just moved to a phenomenal latest home, was financially comfortable and was as a consequence of begin studying for a level in nursing and midwifery.

Don and Gail Patterson and Gail?s sister, Heather Wilkinson, who all died after attending lunch at Don and Gail?s former daughter-in-law, Erin Patterson?s, home on July 29. - 12408649 12435147 12435147 - 12713367 - 13239485 - 13239485 URGENT: 13334171 Mushroom lunch update - Erin Patterson to appear in court today 13643053
Patterson’s in-laws, Don and Gail Patterson, who died after eating the wellington
Heather and Ian Wilkinson in happier times. Mr Wilkinson survived the deadly lunch by Erin Patterson A WOMAN accused of serving poisoned beef Wellington to members of her ex?s family ate her own meal from a different- coloured plate, a court heard. Australian Erin Patterson, who denies murdering three of her guests and nearly killing the fourth by putting toxic mushrooms in the food, invited them to lunch at her home in Leongatha, Victoria.
Gail’s sister Heather Wilkinson and her husband Ian were each poisoned – Heather died and Ian survived (Picture: Yvette Kelly)

But prosecutors suggested Patterson had two faces – the lady who publicly appeared to have a superb relationship together with her parents-in-law, while her private feelings about them were kept hidden.

Her estranged husband Steven Patterson was also invited to the deadly lunch but decided to to not go.

Police have previously said she could have attempted to poison Simon on three separate occasions between 2021 and 2022.

Patterson claimed she didn’t change into in poor health after eating the wellington because she threw up afterwards due to an eating disorder.

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