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Oscar Pistorius broke down in court after hearing the medical examiner describe the wounds, his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp, suffered when he killed her on Valentine’s Day last year.
Pistorius’s brother and sister tried to comfort him as he cried and made loud retching sounds on the accused bench during the premeditated murder trail today in the High Court in Pretoria, South Africa’s capital.
“You need to attend to Mr. Pistorius,” Judge Thokozile Matilda Masipa said, addressing Defense lawyer Barry Roux. “I’m not sure what’s happening.”
Steemkamp died of multiple gunshot wounds through an object such as a door, Gert Saayman said, he also added that she was wearing loose clothing at the time of her death. Judge Masipa ruled earlier that the testimony of Saayman, the head of the forensic medicine department at the University of Pretoria, not be broadcast or be sent as posts on Twitter. Saayman requested his evidence not be streamed live because it was too graphic.
Saayman said Pistorius used Black Talon hollow-point bullets, which he described as “an expanding bullet” that’s designed to cause “maximum tissue damage.” He added that the gunshot wound to the head was incapacitating and almost instantly fatal, Steenkamp probably didn’t breathe more than a few times after the head injury, he said.
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Defense lawyer Barry Roux, challenged the evidence of Pieter Baba, a security guard working at the Silver Woods Country Estate where Oscar Pistorius lived. Mr. Baba testified Pistorius had initially said “everything was fine” when he spoke to him on the phone, after the calls for help came from the neighbors.
Baba said Pistorius called him back crying. Roux argued the screams that neighbors heard were those of Pistorius after realizing he just shot his girlfriend, Steenkamp through the toilet door, and that the other gunshots neighbors say they heard were of Pistorius trying to break down the locked bathroom door with a cricket bat.
The defense lawyer is trying to knock the bottom out of the testimony of neighbors, on the timing of the screams and gunshots and of an ex-girlfriend who claims Pistorius always had a gun next to his bed and carried one with him whenever he could.
The prosecutor will probably call on 100 or more witnesses, about 20 people who live near Pistorius’s home. The charges have hindered his running career and postponed his sponsorship deals with Nike Inc. (NKE) and Luxottica Group SpA’s (LUX) Oakley. This is a tragedy that the entire world is watching.
Image credit: tracking.si.com
