MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — Triple-murderer Erin Patterson appealed her convictions Wednesday for poisoning four of her estranged husband’s relatives with death cap mushrooms.
Three judges of the Victoria state Court of Appeal are hearing her appeal over two days against her convictions on three counts of murder and one of attempted murder relating to a lunch of beef Wellington pastries she prepared at her rural home in Leongatha in July 2023.
Prosecutors are appealing the leniency of her sentence. The 51-year-old was sentenced in September last year to life in prison and must serve at least 33 years behind bars before she can apply for release on parole.
Prosecutors want her to be sentenced for life without possibility of parole.
Defense lawyer Richard Edney’s first ground for appeal Wednesday was an error that resulted in jury members being sequestered in the same hotel as a police witness and members of the prosecution team.
“This was a very serious breach of sequestration,” Edney told the court.
Another defense lawyer, Veronika Drago, said there was no evidence that Patterson had read online posts that reported death cap mushrooms had been seen near the towns of Loch and Outtrim.
The trial heard evidence from a telecommunications expert that Patterson’s phone connected to towers near Outtrim and Loch.
Drago said the evidence was that Patterson’s phone had possibly been in the area.
“That in and of itself, in our submission, illustrates just how dangerous and unfair that evidence was” on Patterson’s trial, Drago said.
Another ground for appeal was that Prosecutor Nanette Rogers’ cross-examination of Patterson over five days had been “unfair and oppressive.”
The defense team also argued that trial judge Christopher Bale had caused “unfair prejudice” by allowing evidence from Patterson’s Facebook “friends” into the trial.
Patterson’s estranged husband, Simon Patterson, was invited to the fatal lunch but did not attend.
His parents, Don and Gail Patterson, and Gail’s sister, Heather Wilkinson, died. Heather’s husband, Ian Wilkinson, spent weeks in hospital, but survived.
Patterson argued during her trial that the poisoning was an accident.
If her appeal succeeds, the judges could overturn her convictions and order a retrial.
Patterson did not attend court on Wednesday and watched the hearing by video in prison.
In pretrial testimony only made public after her trial, Simon Patterson said he suspected his wife had deliberately made him seriously ill with dishes. No poisons were ever found.
Erin Patterson was initially charged with three counts of attempting to murder him on three occasions around Victoria between November 2021 and September 2022. She had denied all charges.
Prosecutors dropped all charges relating to the husband before her trial began in April 2025.
FILE - Erin Patterson is escorted away from the Supreme Court of Victoria in Melbourne, Australia, on Sept. 8, 2025. (Joel Carrett/AAP Image via AP, File)
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said Tuesday he was delaying the 50% U.S. tariffs on $20 billion worth of Canadian imports after the two countries reached a last-minute deal less than two hours before the sanctions were to go into effect.
The announcement, which Trump made on his social media platform, buys time for more negotiations and avoids, for now, another strain in already tense relations between the historic allies.
“I have paused the 50% Tariffs against Canada, that were scheduled to kick in tomorrow morning for a three day period, based on the fact that Canada and the U.S.A., subject to the finalization of documents, have a DEAL!” Trump posted on Truth Social.
If they had gone into effect as scheduled at 12:01 a.m. Wednesday, Trump’s import taxes would have hit Canadian products ranging from hockey sticks to tongue depressors.
But the political impact would likely have been bigger than the economic one. Canada had threatened to retaliate against any new tariffs with levies of its own, aggravating a trade fight between countries that sold each other $880 billion worth of goods and services last year.
A White House proclamation said Canada had expressed a commitment to remove measures the Trump administration considers discriminatory against U.S. alcohol, dairy and motor vehicle exports. Canada did not immediately confirm those commitments.
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said in a statement “substantial progress” had been made but that important work remained, confirming Canada had agreed to the three-day delay while negotiations continued.
Carney and Trump had spoken twice by phone in the past two days about the ongoing negotiations, including a call Tuesday afternoon, Carney’s office said, underscoring the last-minute push for a deal.
Both countries had reason to step back from the brink. Nearly 72% of Canada’s goods exports last year went to the United States. And the Trump administration would be taking a risk by imposing a hefty new tariff — paid by U.S. importers who try to pass along the cost to consumers via higher prices — ahead of November’s midterm elections. U.S. voters are already frustrated with the high cost of living.
“I don’t think either side really wants these tariffs to come into effect,’’ Ryan Majerus, a partner at King & Spalding and a former U.S. trade official, said before the delay was announced. “There’s a pretty strong push on both sides to find an off-ramp here.’’
Canadian Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Candace Laing said in a statement that the three-day tariff delay offered businesses some relief but fell short of the certainty a signed interim agreement would provide.
“This limbo state is not anyone’s preferred outcome,” she said, urging negotiators to reach a deal quickly.
Trump’s approach to dealing with Canada marks an extraordinary departure from the traditionally cooperative relationship between the two countries. Trump has hit Canadian goods with tariffs — in a push to bring manufacturing back to the U.S. — and has repeatedly made inflammatory comments about turning Canada into America’s 51st state.
Trump has made tariffs the centerpiece of his second-term economic agenda. Last year, he imposed double-digit import taxes on almost every country, justifying them by declaring the longstanding U.S. trade deficit a national emergency. The Supreme Court in February ruled that he’d overstepped his authority, striking down those tariffs and setting the stage for the federal government to pay refunds to importers.
So Trump has looked for other legal authority to impose tariffs.
To hit Canada, he reached back to the Great Depression, invoking Section 338 of the Tariff Act of 1930 to threaten 50% tariffs on products that account for about 5% of Canadian exports to the United States.
Nearly a century ago, with the U.S. and world economies in collapse, Congress passed the 1930 tariff law, imposing taxes on imports from around the world. Known as the Smoot-Hawley tariffs, named for their congressional sponsors, they are notorious among economists and historians for limiting world commerce and making the Great Depression worse.
Section 338 tariffs have never been used before.
Section 338 authorizes the president to impose tariffs of up to 50% on imports from countries that have discriminated against U.S. businesses. No investigation is required to justify the levies. Nor is there any limit on how long the tariffs can stay in place.
The U.S. is renegotiating a North American trade pact — the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement — that Trump strong-armed America’s neighbors into accepting in his first term. The threat of Section 338 tariffs gives the United States leverage to seek fresh concessions from Ottawa.
Gillies reported from Toronto.
Canada-U.S. Trade Minister Dominic LeBlanc makes brief comments to reporters outside the U.S. Department of Commerce following a meeting with U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, in Washington, Monday, Aug. 17, 2026. (Kelly Geraldine Malone/The Canadian Press via AP)
United States Trade Representative Jamieson Greer, center, leaves the U.S. Department of Commerce following a meeting with Canadian officials, in Washington, Monday, Aug. 17, 2026. (Kelly Geraldine Malone/The Canadian Press via AP)
