“Coconut head” to continue cross-examination

The last row is reserved for members of the public. Except for a handful of men, they were all young women, who had come to see the man with the “develish coconut head” continue cross-examining Pistorius on his version of what happened in his house in the early hours of Valentine’s Day last year.

The phrase was used by one Linda de Beer Roets to describe prosecutor Gerrie Nel on a blog set up in support of Pistorius, supportforoscar.wordpress.com.

Pistorius is charged with murdering his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp in his Pretoria townhouse. He shot her through a locked toilet door, saying later he mistook her for an intruder.

Journalists seemed just as worn out by Nel’s barrage of questioning as Pistorius, which enters its fifth day on Tuesday, with one remarking to colleagues that “this thing must finish now”.

Several police officers in suits, who had testified for the State at the start of the trial, entered the courtroom through the side entrance carrying armfuls of files.

Pistorius again slipped into the courtroom quietly and sat next to the dock, head down, at one point rubbing his eyes and talking to one of his relatives who is part of his escort into and out of the building each day.

Pistorius is also charged with three contraventions of the Firearms Control Act.

– Sapa