Mushroom Poison Lady Will Be Convicted
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My prediction is that the alleged mushroom poison lady will be convicted and sentenced as a mass murderer. No great shakes, I hear you say. But, and this is the point of this post, I further predict that she will follow in the footsteps of prior Aussie femme fatales like Lindy Chamberlain and Kathleen Folbigg. These publicly excoriated Aussie women were later released and their crimes pardoned on the basis of wrongful convictions. Erin Patterson has all the hallmarks of the Australian predilection for going to town over femme fatales downunder. Nothing excites the media and the locals more than a deadly woman.
“The term originates from the French phrase femme fatale, which means ‘deadly woman’ or ‘lethal woman’. “
Death Cap Erin & Her Beef Wellingtons On Trial
The last supper for the unlucky trio at table with Erin Patterson on that fateful day was, by all reports, a fairly sedate affair on the surface. Chatter about pantries, I hear, was popular but it did not inspire a viewing of Erin’s. Little did they and the sole survivor among the lunch guests know that deeper enmities were at play here. ‘Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned’, according to William Congreve. It seems, as if, Erin Patterson did feel scorned by these people, if the Crown’s case holds true. Death by deadly mushroom laced beef Wellington is no, obviously, accidental occurrence, it would appear.
Death By Cooking Mushrooms For Lunch Wrapped In Pastry
I suggest that we must look to appearances if we are to really understand the public’s fascination with this case. A good beef Wellington is a thing to behold fresh out of the oven! Steam rising from beneath the golden baked pastry. Erin Patterson is by all superficial looks overweight and not the usual femme fatale type. What hides beneath the visage of this seemingly well fed lady? She appears to play the victim in all this via her constant weeping captured on camera. Despite the fact that her dinner plate was a different colour to all other lunch guests (orange to the guest’s 4 grey plates) Erin was also unwell after eating the meal she provided. Not deathly so, of course, unlike the other four lunch guests. Ian Wilkinson survived but not his wife. The pastor may have been fortunate, perhaps, due to some divine intervention? Who knows really? It was touch and go for a while there for Ian. The ex-husband of Erin Patterson wisely refused the lunch invitation and, according to police, may have been victim of earlier unsuccessful attempts at poisoning him.
Erin ‘Cleopatra’ Patterson
The alleged mushroom poison lady will be convicted, I reckon. Cooking as a nefarious means of murder is nothing new but it has been some time since it has made the front pages of the newspapers. I personally know a thing or two about cooking on a grand scale and cooking for guests. Catering was my thing for a few decades. Thus, the poison artfully hidden via dehydrating death cap mushrooms is a dastardly Cleopatra like act. The Egyptian queen was partial to employing vipers in her elimination of inconvenient royal family siblings. Erin’s alleged mass murders were not obviously power plays but, beneath our ignorance of the deeper familial dynamics, perhaps the Wilkinson’s were seen as enemies by Erin. Relationships, intimate ones, are often influenced by extended family.
Femme Fatale & Hospitality
Femme fatale wipes out whole family, almost, is a headline that has captured the heart of the nation. Well, maybe not the heart but the ghoulish busy body minds of a nation. Legacy media loves a good murder. It warms the cockles of those cold and bitter personages called publishers. If you know anything about the ancient world and our roots, you may be aware of the importance of ‘hospitality’. Welcoming guests and travellers into your home in the ancient world was a sacred duty. Providing hospitality, the same root word pops up in ‘hospital’, and therefore involves the social duties of offering shelter and nourishment. To murder guests at the dining table in this manner is a crime against the Gods in addition to its more earthly transgression. I can see the Greek myths of the Furies persecuting characters like Orestes in this melodrama.
“THE ERINYES (Furies) were three goddesses of vengeance and retribution who punished men for crimes against the natural order. They were particularly concerned with homicide, unfilial conduct, offenses against the gods, and perjury. A victim seeking justice could call down the curse of the Erinys upon the criminal. The most powerful of these was the curse of the parent upon the child–for the Erinyes were born of just such a crime, being sprung from the blood of Ouranos (Uranus), when he was castrated by his son Kronos (Cronus).”
Alleged Female Killers On Trial
When a case like this makes the news and is lodged there, like an all day sucker in the mouth of a young child, it excites a furious response in us all. Everyone has an opinion, as they did with Lindy and that ‘dingo took my baby’ line. Femme fatales are not all outwardly sexy ladies and who knows the true nature of us in the bedroom with the lights out and a partner to straddle? We are not all cut from the same size 8 cloth. No, some women are judged to be lacking matronly qualities to their detriment when on trial. Some are adjudged to be impenetrable deep files and condemned on this basis, as seeming too unfeeling and unemotional. The police and law and order are archetypally masculine. Many more men are cops than women. A lot of top government lawyers are blokes too. Those that make the decisions about who gets charged and which cases go to trial historically have been men. Gender plays a big part in these things.
The Mushroom Wellington Murderess
The alleged mushroom poison lady will be convicted. My reading of the evidence presented so far leads me to think this way. I do predict that there is every chance that many years down the track there will be a reversal of some sort in this matter. Personally, I have made many Wellingtons over the years and served them at functions far and wide. Beef Wellingtons and tofu Wellingtons too – all containing lovely mushrooms. I do hope that this delicious dish will not suffer from association with a foul act that cost the lives of 3 human beings.
“The evidence suggests that there were people who knew or strongly suspected the culprits carrying the infectious agents at the time. However, those writing the histories which have survived are most often religious scribes attributing most everything to a divine source fitting their theistic world view. Thus, we get a very skewed vision of the past not only in relation to plague but most everything else too. “
Robert Sudha Hamilton is the author of America Matters: Pre-apocalyptic Posts & Essays in the Shadow of Trump.
©MidasWord
