Oscar will not testify first – lawyers
Murder-accused Oscar Pistorius will most probably not be the first defence witness to take to the stand when his trial resumes next week, his lawyers said on Tuesday.
Paralympian Oscar Pistorius sits in the dock during his trial for the murder of his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp at the North Gauteng High Court in Pretoria on Tuesday, 25 March 2014. Picture: Esa Alexander/Times Media Group/Pool
Brian Webber, who is on Pistorius’s legal team, said it was likely that pathologist Jan Botha would be the first defence witness to be called.
“He [Botha] has personal reasons as to why he wants to testify first,” said Webber.
The paralympic athlete is on trial for the murder of his model and law graduate girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp. He shot her dead through a locked toilet door at his Pretoria home on Valentine’s Day last year. He claims he mistook her for an intruder.
The State argues it was premeditated murder. It closed its case last Tuesday, after calling 21 witnesses, from a list of 107, in 15 days, including Pistorius’s ex-girlfriend Samantha Taylor, his friends and several of neighbours.
Pistorius’s trial began in the High Court in Pretoria on March 3. It was postponed on Friday after one of the judge’s assessors fell ill.
It was set to resume next Monday.
– Sapa
