Oscar sobs, gags as Reeva pics are shown
Paralympian Oscar Pistorius sobbed and gagged in the stand at the High Court in Pretoria on Tuesday as photos of Reeva Steenkamp's corpse flashed onto a screen next to him.
A police officer brought him a bright green bucket as he propped his head on his hand and turned red as he tried to contain himself.
He was being led by his lawyer Barry Roux in testifying about the moments leading up to him shooting and killing his girlfriend Steenkamp in the early morning of February 14 last year.
He fired four times through the locked door of his toilet, apparently believing there was an intruder behind it.
Moments after the officer had placed the bucket at his feet, Pistorius straightened in his chair, folded his arms across his chest and continued his testimony.
The photos of Steenkamp, showing the bullet wound to her head, appeared on screens around the court during a search for a photo of the passage between Pistorius’s bedroom and bathroom.
He had told the court that when he woke up and heard his bathroom window sliding open, “everything changed”.
“The first thing that went through my mind was that I need to arm myself. I need to protect Reeva and myself.”
He got out of bed on his stumps and went around to the other side of it, his hand out in front of him because it was dark.
“I grabbed my firearm from under the bed and took it out of the holster.”
As he was about to leave the bedroom to go and investigate the source of the noise, he whispered to Steenkamp.
“I slowed down and I had my hand extended in front of me. I whispered to Reeva to phone the police.”
He approached the bathroom from his bedroom.
“I was overcome with fear and shouted for the intruder to get out and for Reeva to call the police.”
Shortly before he reached the bathroom, he said, he started shouting again.
“I heard a door slam, which could only have been the toilet door.”
Court was then adjourned for lunch.
Pistorius is accused of murdering Steenkamp in his Pretoria townhouse.
He is also charged with contraventions of the Firearms Control Act. He allegedly fired a shot from a Glock pistol under a table at a Johannesburg restaurant in January 2013.
On September 30, 2012 he allegedly shot through the open sunroof of a car with his 9mm pistol while driving with friends in Modderfontein.
– Sapa
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