It's an overcast day outside Latrove Valley Law Courts as the jury has been impaneled in the case of accused triple murderer Aaron Patterson. The trial has now officially begun and the judge had a development for the jury. I'm Brooke Greebert Craig and this is the Mushroom Cook. So we've just come out of court for the first official day of Aaron Patterson's murder trial. It's a bit drizzly outside. There are about twenty five reporters in the courtroom. Laura was erin in there.
Yes she was. She was seated in the dock today. She was dressed in a pink and white striped shirt with long sleeves. She had her glasses tucked into that shirt and her long hair draped over her shoulders. And can you describe a bit about the courtroom. Yes, So the courtroom here in Morwell today was packed with journalists. Like you said, there's a lot of wood paneling in this courtroom, about thirty seats or so, not including obviously the seats the jurors are sitting in and all the lawyers.
And actually by the door, there's a whole lot of hand sanitizer and face masks.
So what happens in the hearing today?
So the jury was impaneled. We have fifteen men and women. That break down is ten men and five women. They will decide this case. But we'll go back to our makeshift podcast studio later and we'll talk about that whole process and what.
Did the jury hear.
So one thing that Justice Christopher Biale mentioned to the jury today was that the three attempted murder charges against erin relating to an estranged husband, Simon Patterson, have been dropped. He told the jurors those charges had been discontinued by the prosecution and said, in other words, those charges have been dropped and you must put them out of your mind.
And Justice spill spoke to the jury about other things. What were they?
Yeah, So today was all about the judge's directions. So these are like the instructions that the jury have to follow throughout the whole trial. One of the most important things he touched on was not doing your own research, making sure they're only deciding the facts of this case on the evidence they're hearing and seeing in court.
Okay, Laura, let's head out of the rain and get back to the studio.
Sounds good to me.
So we're back in our makeshift studio after the jury impanelment went down today we went in it. But Laura, can you tell us a bit more about the process.
Yes, for sure. So any jury impanelment will start with all the people in the jury pool coming to court. So in this case, the potential jury members have come from all over the Gippsland region Today at the Latro Valley Law Courts. They would gather in a jury pool room and then things get underway. The judge will ask members of the pool to come into the courtroom and on each seat in the courtroom will be a list
of names. So this list is really important because it's a list of all of the people who'll be involved in this trial. So we're talking lawyers, witnesses and even to an extension, court staff, people who are going to be around and involved in this trial. It is really important that no jury member knows anyone in this trial. That's how the court can trust that these jury members will remain impartial. So the people in the jury pool are asked to look through that list and make sure
that they don't know anyone. Once this process has taken place, the judge will usually give a short overview of the case, just so everyone in the room knows what the trial is about. In this case, my understanding is that they don't want anyone in the jury who knows too much about this case. So, for example, anyone who's listened to our podcast would not be encouraged to be on this jury.
So once everyone in the room has been put on notice about these things, the judge will ask if anyone wishes to be excused.
What excuses could the potential jurors give.
Yeah, So, for example, especially given that the Gippsland area a lot of people know each other, someone might say I actually knew Heather Wilkinson or I knew Don Patterson, and that is definitely a reason why they should not sit in on the jury. But other people might say, you know too much about this case. I've been following it for a while. I don't think I can be impartial.
So in cases, the judge can sometimes ask people to write down their reasons on a piece of paper and that gets handed up to the judge, or in other cases, that potential jury member might be asked to go into the witness box and make that explanation, the judge will then make a decision about whether or not that potential jury member should still remain in the pool. If they decide they should leave the courtroom, then that will occur.
So once we've cut it down to the people who could be on the jury, the remaining people are allocated numbers. Those numbers are put into a ballot box and the ballot begins.
So once their number is actually pulled out, does that mean that they automatically get to be on the jury.
So a potential jury member will start walking towards the jury box and there'll be discussions happening in that moment between Erin and her lawyer. The only information they have to go off is what this potential jury member looks like and their occupation. From that, Erin and I llegal Ta get to make a decision about whether or not that person sits in on the jury. But they only can do that up to three times without giving a reason why.
So can the jurors talk to anyone about the case.
Then it's really not encouraged. So obviously, once everyone is impaneled on the jury, then they are the jury members selected to decide this case. So it actually is important that they talk amongst themselves, but during the empanelment process there isn't a lot of opportunity to talk and it's definitely not encouraged because we're just trying to focus on selecting those people to sit on the jury.
And that means that the media can't speak to them either.
No, that's definitely not allowed. That's both during the impanelment process, during the trial and even after. So in Australia, journalists aren't allowed to talk to jurors even once their job is done, and.
Can the jurors then talk to their family and friends.
Not during the trial. Usually the judge will be okay with them explaining to their family friends that they are sitting in on a trial and that the trial is expected to go for a number of weeks. But beyond that, in terms of the evidence in the facts of the case, they're explicitly told not to talk about that with people in their lives because they shouldn't be hearing those external opinions.
So it's pretty strict. So then what's the penalty then, Yeah, the penalties can be pretty severe, and the jury members are told this once they're impaneled.
They're told that if they breach any of these rules, including the rules to not do their own research, you know, no Google searchers, no reading the newspaper. They have to decide this case on the evidence they hear and see every day. And if they don't do that, if they get external information and they get caught, they could go to jail. Oh gosh, yeah, it's very serious. Jury members need to stay in line.
So then what can we look forward to you tomorrow?
Then? So, tomorrow are the all important openings. This has been a day we have been waiting for. We will be hearing from both the prosecution and the defense about how they put their case, and the jury will hear it for the first time too. The addresses lay out how the trial will run. The prosecution will walk through the witnesses that the jury members will hear from, and the defense will also get an opportunity here to state their case.
And once again we will be covering that proceedings right.
Yes, so you and I will be at court tomorrow. We will be running a live blog on our website to make sure our readers are up to date with all the information that the jury is hearing. But then once the proceedings are done, you and I will jump back here in our makeshift podcast studio and record an episode for our listeners.
To stay across all our coverage, head to the mushroomcook dot com dot au