Oscar Pistorius trial part 3

[JillJ72]

Hiya,

Thread 1 here - www.mumsnet.com/Talk/in_the_news/2022610-Oscar-Pistorius-trial

Thread 2 here - www.mumsnet.com/Talk/in_the_news/2049921-Oscar-Pistorius-trial-part-2

To continue our respectful, open, interesting discussion.

Apparently Nel once cross examined someone for eight days! Poor bugger whoever that was (I wonder if they were found guilty?)

I think he'll finish tomorrow or Tuesday latest. I can't see him going on much longer.

louise I was mostly interested in the arterial spurt claim, not the rest... It does sound too much to comprehend and I doubt he would be callous enough to want her to die, even if he did deliberately shoot

If that makes sense. I really don't think he meant for her to die... I think he MAY have shot her in anger in the heat of the moment or even really truthfully mistaken her for an intruder, but I don't think he meant for her to die.

I was taught plastic bags could be used as tourniquets. Did he try to use them as pads over the wounds? That would be odd as I presume he wouldnt have a stock in the bathroom, towels more likely in there?

Or perhaps there was one there and it was close to hand?

Its something to do with being able to put pressure on the wound to stem the bleeding i think

So, was that what he definately used? No towels? Suppose its one of those things that sounds rather odd but means nothing?

Jill perhaps! I have got an overall feeling from this that he is very childish and naive in terms of his use of guns (they are "cool", give him a sense of authority or something) so I think if he did pause at the top of the stairs, it will have been a case of sheer shock at what he'd actually done

I am an assessor for first aid, and we don't include black bags at all

Re Peter Baba - he made the comment, I think twice, that he was so shocked by what he saw that he didn't even notice what OP was wearing.

Does this strike anyone else as an odd thing to say.

It made me think of Baldrick/Father Dougal

Re the locking herself in the bathroom, why is it so hard to believe? I could see them having an argument and her locking herself in the toilet waiting for him to calm down- it could have had the opposite effect and infuriated him and he could have run to grab his gun. He could then have threatened her and shot at the door in frustration....

There are so many scenarios sadly.

Springy people say weird things when they are shocked. Didn't Baba say he fainted?

Am still reading the transcript, one thing that strikes me is that everyone (the witnesses) seems to have gone to bed at 9 or 10pm. Is that normal for SA, it seems awfully early?

Howaboutno I agree about childish and naive.

I have said before that I have met him and he seemed so very "young". I would have said childlike rather than childish. And I wonder if that is as a result of moving from childhood into the periphery of national notice, which he achieved at a young age.

I would imagine that his manager and his coach have pretty much sorted everything for him in the last 8 years, and he is used to having someone else deal with whatever. He has maybe been cossetted to such an extent that he doesn't acknowledge that he has to answer for what he does.

He has said in many interviews that he is a private person and deals with the "celebrity" part as a means to an end.

The bathroom window being opened is important to OP's case
Nothing says it ever occurred.
Not beyond the bounds of possibility to imagine that the window was always open. The balcony window was open after all.

I find this hard, hard because I don't want to believe that he simply murdered her. That makes me really question myself as I often deal with violence and extreme behaviours/opathy during my everyday.

Do I feel like this because he was an Olympian?
Famous?
Shamefully, because he was disabled?

Depending on if OP was training, that may not be late - have seen pics he's put up of running track at 6am, and as so hot that day, training better early when cooler? I also like to relax in/on the bed rather than the sofa. That's me though. But I don't run (DH and DS laughed today when I clicked my allotment heels - I am not a boingy person!).

Early to bed in SA as the sunsets and rises early IME

Ronald OP captured people's imagination, a story of triumph over adversity, an inspiration, aspirational. And good looking to boot. What isn't to like?

OP as pre-14 February 2013.

Post-murder. Very mixed feelings. Who wouldn't turn the clock back? Who wouldn't berate him now (don't answer that, we know they're out there 'the fans')?

For me, I don't think anything to do with his disability. For me, a simple case of disbelief that someone who had it all did something so utterly stupid, utterly reckless, utterly final, and threw it all away, took a life, ruined many lives, undid so much good work. Not that he was perfect or untouchable, but that he is so disappointingly no better than the next person that fires a weapon and kills.

The other evidence that was quickly passed over was the evidence of the witness who heard crying etc for an hour before the gunshots
Although she was pressed hard by Roux she seemed very solid and stable

She also said she had heard a man say help, help, help
Before the shots
When pushed she said perhaps he was mocking the crying woman

That was devastating testimony. She doesn't seem to be a fantasist but it is always a possibility.
They don't have aircon or ceiling fans and this is why they think they heard the sounds.

Yes Jill, and that's probably the reason so many of us have an interest in something that has happened so far away.

i too think that the disability should not be considered. He was totally reckless but while he may still have his life, what kind of life.

To know that people think you are a cold blooded murderer, to have lost all your income streams, to know that you await a slow death inside the worse prisons that we can imagine, and to have lost the woman you say you loved.

Incomprehensible.

And Reeva, she looked lovely, she sounded lovely, she clearly wanted to make OP happy. How sad for her. And as mentioned by one of the journalists, how sad that for all the pics she had taken, the last one that people will remember was the one that a PP inadvertantly linked to.

I can't even say anymore. There are no winners in this

People typically start their working day an hour earlier than we do

Ronald I see your point about is it because he's famous etc. Interestingly there seems to be a lot of antipathy (to be polite) towards him on the internet and a lot of it is aimed at his disability so maybe it works both ways.

Not a clue about the window.

Springy in the interviews I've seen he comes cross as being very young even for someone in his early 20s as he was in quite a few of those I've watched.

I thought he was an amazing and inspirational person. Of course that doesn't mean he couldn't be a killer as well.

I did find the Netcare advice strange (although I don't think for a second that it was because OP lied about the injuries!). Advising someone to make their own way to hospital with a patient with three gunshot wounds including one to the head seemed really irresponsible.
OneStep I think they only used the plastic bags downstairs. I don't think there has been any mention of what OP did upstairs to help Reeva with her injuries, if indeed he did anything. He might have been too shocked.
I also don't think he deliberately paused on the stairs or any of those lurid claims but I think he was confused about whether or not she was breathing (his testimony on whether or not she was breathing in the toilet changed) and that may have caused him to pause at different points as he thought she was already dead iyswim.

He does seem very immature and protected. His responses include crying,, pretending not to remember, getting facts mixed up and blaming others to get out of trouble. Violence and losing your temper also immature.

So sad.

Ronald was that testimony from Michelle Burger? I've read her testimony tonight and this puzzled me (Yes, I am making notes.)

"Burger: When I last heard the woman scream, was very shortly after the last shot"

Roux pushed this a couple of minutes later:

"Roux: You are quite clear that after the last shot you heard her?
Burger: I heard her"

(Sky transcripts).

I thought Reeva couldn't have screamed after she was shot in the head?

Could she have heard OP? Maybe they weren't shots but the cricket bat on the door? She was quite a distance away wasn't she?

It is all so confusing.

Dr Stipp called the ambulance after security were there and Mr Stander and his daughter were there
Stipp had by this time examined Ms Steenkamp and seen she was already dead
When he went outside to where Stander was ( on his cellphone )and asked if an ambulance had been called
It hadn't and so Stipp thencalled one.

Why did no one call an ambulance?
Shock?
Although unfortunately the wounds were catastrophic it makes no sense that it wouldn't have been the first call.

Awful that OP felt that Stipp was useless in the situation but
I guess if you are hoping someone will make everything better and it is clear to the Dr that the patient is already dead it isn't a situation where he could have impressed OP.

Yes Jill i too thought he was an amazing, inspirational and downright lovely person. I spent 5 hours in his company, and I thought he was wonderful. I remarked at the time - yes on MN - thaif he was a fake, his mask would have slipped at some point, but it really didn't.

But yes public v private persona - none of us can really know the people we admire. Feet of clay and all that.

Sad

Ronald - so what are Netcare? I thought they were the private ambulance company and OP definitely called them, it's in the phone records. So they really did tell him to take her himself?

I am more and more confused. I thought the ambulance arrived fairly quickly?

Louise yes I remember being confused by that statement too. It made me wonder if the sounds travelled differently and that they seemed to overlap even when they hadn't or if there was something that made a noise that wasn't a gunshot eg if there was a bang on the door, then 3 shots, in which case Reeva could have screamed afterwards. If only all the witnesses had heard the same thing.