Oscar Trial: More focus on pics
A photo showing a test of a cricket bat striking the upper part of a door was excluded from pictorial evidence submitted for Oscar Pistorius's murder trial, the High Court in Pretoria heard on Tuesday.
Barry Roux, lawyer for paralympian Oscar Pistorius, is seen at the North Gauteng High Court in Pretoria, Monday, 17 March 2014. Pistorius has pleaded not guilty to premeditated murder, claiming that he believed there was an intruder hiding in a locked toilet cubicle in his home when he fired four shots into it, fatally wounding his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp.Picture:Daniel Born/Pool
Barry Roux, SC, for the paralympian, asked police photographer Warrant Officer Barend van Staden why these pictures, taken by the defence, were not included in the trial album.
This was after an exhausting day in court with Roux checking the photo albums taken after Pistorius said he shot his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp dead.
Van Staden said he compiled the albums in consultation with forensic analyst Colonel Johan Vermeulen.
Pressed by Roux, he said Vermeulen told him to leave it out, but said it would be word play to say that Vermeulen insisted he leave it out.
Vermeulen conducted tests to analyse Pistorius’s version of events in the early hours of Valentine’s Day, when Pistorius said he shot Steenkamp because he thought there was an intruder in the bathroom.
He fired four shots into the toilet door in his bathroom at Silver Woods estate in Pretoria and then realised it was Steenkamp in the toilet. She had been spending the night.
On realising this, he put his prosthetic legs on, kicked at the door and bashed it with a cricket bat to free her.
Vermeulen said in testimony that in his opinion Pistorius bashed the door without his prosthetic legs, but did not put this in his report.
– Sapa
