Sorry. I feel too uncomfortable about coming to the lunch with you, Mom, Dad, Heather and Ellian tomorrow, but I'm happy to talk to you about your health and implications of that at another time. If you'd like to discuss it on the phone, just let me know.
That's really disappointing. I've spent many hours this week preparing lunch for tomorrow, which has been exhausting in light of the issues I'm facing, and spent a small fortune on beef. I Philip to make beef Wellington's because I wanted it to be a special meal, as I may not be able to host a lunch like this again for some time. It's important to me that you're all there tomorrow and that I can have the conversations that I need to have. I hope you'll change your mind. Your parents and Heather
and Ian are coming at twelve thirty. I hope to see you there.
You've just heard a reading of text messages between Aaron Patterson and her ex husband Simon and exchange they had a day before Aaron cooked the fateful mushroom lunch. It talks to a fractured relationship. Today, Simon took to the stand and told the jury about his life with the woman accused of killing his parents and his auntie. I'm Brook Greenbert Craig and this is the Mushroom Cook. Welcome back, Laura.
Can you believe we're nearly at the end of the week.
I know it's gone so fast. Yes, the jury heard from Simon today and he spoke at length about his relationship with Aaron Patterson.
Today was the first day of evidence in the trial, and Simon was the first prosecution witness. So this involves him getting into the witness box, taking an oath, and then he's questioned by the lead prosecutor. We mentioned her yesterday, Nannette Rodgers, and like you said, he was questioned a lot at length about his relationship with Erin and the circumstances surrounding the lunch.
The center of this case is this deadly lunch where three people died in the days after it. If we go back to Simon being invited to the lunch, talk me through about what the jury heard.
He told the jury today that he was invited to that lunch on July sixteen, twenty twenty three, And just to remind our listeners, the lunch was on July twenty nine, so she's let them know about the lunch about two weeks earlier at a church service. At the time, Simon said he would come despite being reluctant, but the day before the lunch he texts her late at night, and that exchange is what our listeners heard at the top
of the episode. So Simon was asked about this text exchange today, but he was also asked a series of questions just about his relationship with Erin, describing what she was like, how the relationship had an on and off nature. Let's unpack that now.
The jury heard that Simon and Aaron met in the early two thousands when they were both working at Monash City Council. Simon was a civil engineer and Erin was working as an RSBCA representative.
Yeah, he said she always loved animals.
He also said that she's witty, intelligent and funny as well.
And he speaks about those being some of the traits that led to him falling in love with her all those years ago.
Something of note that Simon said was that Aaron had always been a devoted mother to her two kids. He said that her daily life really revolved around them and she took her role as a parent very seriously. Simon also spoke about Aaron's relationship with his parents, Don and Gale Patterson.
He spoke quite a lot about Don and Aaron sharing a love of knowledge and learning, and said they shared an interest in the world.
Don and Gale were quite supportive of Aaron and Simon's relationship even though they separated and reconciled a lot throughout their marriage.
And just in terms of the timeline, we heard that Simon and Aaron met in the early two thousands. They were married by two thousand and seven, had children in two thousand and nine and twenty fourteen, but by twenty fifteen they permanently separated.
In that time, Aaron and Simon did a lot of traveling together. They really shared the same passion of exploring nature.
They did share a lot of these common interests. And the interesting thing is is despite separating in twenty fifteen, they remained friends. And Simon said today they remained friends for quite a number of years up until about twenty twenty two when something happened with his tax return.
Yeah, their relationship did turn soura at that point in time.
Simon told the jury today that when he was dropping off the two children one day at Aaron's house, she said she had become aware of a change in his tax return where his marital status had been altered to separated.
Aaron was not happy about that, and she made that very clear to Simon at the time.
Simon told the court that Aaron told him that change in his marital status would have tax implications for the two of them, and as a result, she demanded child support from him moving forward. He then told the court their relationship substantially changed. Something that once was a friendship that involved chatty conversations over text, he said, turned to very functional messages just about the day to day life of their children.
Things that weren't an issue became an issue. Simon told the court that Erin was keen to split their children's school fees, but he told her child support had told him not to do that because it was already covered by the child support fees.
Simon recalled Erin being very upset about that. Simon was questioned a lot today about the properties Aaron owned, some with him, some without him, and.
That was all stemmed by the inheritance that Aaron was given after her grandma died and her mother died.
The inheritance totaled about two million dollars, but Simon told the court that it dribbled out in installments over about eight years.
So just to clarify, Aaron was the beneficiary of two separate estates. Aaron's grandma died in two thousand and six and Aaron's mother died in twenty nineteen.
That's correct, and Simon told the jury Erin used part of her inheritance very generously.
Simon has three siblings and Aaron and him lent them around four hundred thousand dollars each.
And while we're talking about properties, there were a few that were mentioned today in court, and I must admit there were times where I was struggling to keep up. Could you please explain You've.
Really put me on the spot here. Okay, I'm sorry, it is complicated, so stay here with me. The jury heard of four separate properties, two properties in Karenbara, one in Mount Waverley and another one in lean Gatha, and that's where the mill took place. Simon said that Aaron put his name on the Mountain Waverley and lean Gather the titles despite them being separated by this point in twenty nineteen. Okay, now I'm going to bring it back to the lunch and I'm going to throw to you Laura.
Oh no, this is Carmer. I guess we haven't touched much on the lunch yet. But Simon was questioned by both the prosecution and the defense today about the lead up and the aftermath. We must remember that he wasn't actually at the lunch himself. The day after the lunch, on the Sunday, his parents told him they were quite unwell.
They described experiencing diarrhea and vomiting. Knowing that his aunt and uncle, Heather and Ian, were also at the lunch, he went over to their home to check that they were okay.
And the prosecution really focused on questions that Heather asked Simon.
They did. Simon recalled Heather, telling him I noticed Aaron served herself her food on a colored plate which was different to the rest. Then later that afternoon, when Simon was drying both Ian and Heather to hospital, Heather touched on this topic again. She asked, is Aaron short of crockery? Is that why she would have this different kind of colored plate that she served herself on?
So that really stood out to Heather the fact that there were different colored plates.
Yeah, I believe the word she used was puzzled. She says she was puzzled by it. But in response in the car, Simon said to her Arin doesn't have that many plates and that might be the reason why.
And as we heard yesterday in the prosecution openings, Crown Prosecutor Nannette Rogers said the guess mills were served on gray plates and Aaron served her meal on a tanned orange plate.
Under cross examination today by Colin Mandy, Simon said that Aaron owned a mixture of plates and that they weren't all the same. After driving his aunt and uncle to hospital, there was a point in time where Simon returned to be with his parents and this was a point today in court where Simon became visibly emotional.
Yes, the jury would have seen how emotional Simon got. He asked for tissues and this is when he was talking about how unwell his parents were in hospital.
He said his dad was substantially worse than his mum and said it looked like he was really struggling, and described him as lying on his side, hunched with a discolored face. But then Later in his evidence, Simon spoke about how Aaron appeared after the lunch. He told the jury that she wanted to go to hospital, but was worried she might pool her pants on the drive.
I know that sounds like a bit too much tea am I, but it was set in court. Simon gave evidence over many hours today. Is there anything we may have missed, Laura, That's.
A good question. I'll just cast my mind back. He did also mention that it was very rare for Aaron to invite guests over to her home. He said that as a wider family, especially when they were still together, he didn't think they ever had a gathering of that size at their house.
But Simon isn't done giving evidence yet. He will be back on the stand tomorrow in front of the jury. To stay up to date with all our latest coverage, go to the mushroomcook dot com dot au