Gil Marsden, the director of Stan‘s upcoming “Revealed – Death Cap Murders,” says Erin Patterson’s sentencing this week has given a sense of closure to some, but the wounds for the community at the centre of the case remain raw.
During a planned lunch in the Victorian town of Leongatha on July 29, 2023, Patterson intentionally poisoned four of her relatives with highly toxic death cap mushrooms. Three of the four guests died within three days – her in-laws Don and Gail Patterson as well as Gail’s sister Heather Wilkinson. Heather’s husband Ian survived the poisoning despite serious hospitalisation.
On July 7, 2025, a jury in the Supreme Court of Victoria convicted Patterson of three counts of murder and one of attempted murder. On September 8, she received three life sentences for the murders, as well as a 25-year sentence for the attempted murder of Ian Wilkinson, to be served concurrently.
Marsden, who spent more than a year embedded in the neighbouring town of Korumburra while making the three-part documentary series, tells Variety AU/NZ that the project was always intended to evolve alongside the twists of the legal process, and this week is no different.
“We were prepared pretty early for the story to change as we were telling it,” he says. “The amount of information that was thrown out, the amount of evidence that was thrown out, attempted murder charges getting dropped right before this — those were all things we couldn’t have anticipated. But sentencing was always a critical part. We wanted to give ourselves time to update and get the sentencing side of the story correct.”
Part one of Marsden’s three-part series is set to premiere this Sunday, September 14. The timing, he said, is kismet, although he joked he’d “love to take credit for a brilliantly orchestrated release.” In fact, production deliberately held back certain material until the court process was complete.
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“We wanted to make sure we timed the release of the first part so that some of the deeper investigation work we’ve done, some of the people who’ve known and haven’t gone on the record before, we can tell their story without it impacting the court process,” he tells Variety AU/NZ.
For Marsden, Patterson’s conviction and sentencing mark only one stage of a much longer healing process for those caught in the case, which garnered global attention.
“This trauma has a comma on it as of yesterday, but it’s ongoing,” he continues. “We go into this wanting to bear witness to what the town experienced, what the families experienced. Hopefully, with the results of yesterday, there’s a bit of peace and respite for the family and the town.”