Oscar lawyer sees ‘remarkable similarities’

Barry Roux, SC, for Pistorius, said three quarters of a statement presented by Michelle Burger were similar to that of her husband Charl.

“It seems like the one was used as a template for the other,” said Roux, cross-examining Burger.

Earlier, Burger maintained she was not present when her husband relayed his version of events to the police officer.

“We didn’t go and try and discuss and manipulate anything,” said Burger.

She said while the police officer taking her statement may have been in possession of her husband’s statement, she had not seen it.

The police officer had come to their home to take the statement.

“I didn’t look for my husband’s statement or ask to see it,” said Burger.

She said her husband had left the house after giving his statement, leaving the police officer with her.

Roux questioned why she and her husband Charl Johnson’s statements were, paragraph by paragraph, the same when they stated details such as that they went to bed between 9pm and 10pm on the first floor of their home .

The atmosphere was leavened with laughter after the confirmation that Burger and her husband were “in the same room”.

Roux said it was remarkable that she and her husband said exactly the same thing about placing a call to security for help at 3.16am on February 14 that lasted 58 seconds.

“There was only one call, it was the same call,” said Burger,” flicking a page of a document in front of her and straightening herself up.

On Monday the court heard that Johnson’s statement tells of a different number of shots to the four Burger heard.

Johnson is on the witness list.

The couple live at the Silverstreams Estate, which is next to Silverwoods Country Estate, the complex where Pistorius shot and killed Steenkamp.

Burger claimed to have heard screams and shots coming from Pistorius’s home, which was about 177 metres away from her home.

The State will try to prove that Pistorius committed premeditated murder when he shot and killed his girlfriend through a bathroom door in his Pretoria home on February 14 last year.

In addition, he is charged with premeditated murder and illegal possession of a firearm and ammunition.

Pistorius’s lawyers will argue that he mistook her for an intruder when he shot through the bathroom door.

– Sapa