Oscar Pistorius Trial Part 8

[Roussette]

here is Number 7.

Marking place, need to catch up. Let's hope there is justice for Reeva soon.

Surprised Nel was actually able to ask him any questions based on anything other than clarification of what he said as he "had no idea" that this witness would appear ?

Overnight there was a statement from Fourie stating that he needed to move rooms because he wanted to be fully prepared for his race.

So we're continuing with the cross examination of the agent. So far, his statement that Oscar never discussed his relationship with Taylor has been proven incorrect with emails. Ditto, the suggestion that he'd never asked a previous girlfriend to travel with him - Taylor travelled with him.

There's an article which referred to Oscar's anger, which the agent hadn't read before.

Back to his relationship with Sam Taylor. He invited her to London. Agent says he didn't know. Nel counters with the comment that he called Taylor's mother to try to get the family to London. Agent doesn't recall that.

When pressed that his evidence was yesterday, that Reeva was the only girlfriend he travelled with, Agent responds that he hadn't been asked to arrange Taylor's travel. It seems fairly disingenuous to me.

Also, according to a letter Oscar wrote to Taylor, he states that he asked Peet (the agent) to do everything he could to find a ticket to her. So either Peet is lying, or Oscar lied to Taylor.

He says he cannot recall trying to arrange a ticket.

Would someone mind explaining why Roux gave the Judge photographs of the ambulance arriving at a particular time please? I couldn't quite hear and understand why he wanted to do that.

He intends to refer to them in his closing argument, and that was the most convenient time to pass them across.

Good grief Oldwadge is hard to listen to. Zzzzz. Utterly charmless.

Marking place to catch up later

Great thank you Looking.

Am out and about all day, trying to keep updated on here!

No massive upsets from this morning, Crazee.

The Olympic Team Physician is an expert in nervous responses, and has known and worked with OP for 6 years.

Some of his evidence related to how OP scored quite highly on some of the stress questionnaires taken before and after sporting events, even in comparison to other disabled athletes. This means that his startle reflex and his fight or flight responses would have been higher. I'm not sure how this might contradict the contents of the psychiatrist and psychologist reports.

He then referred to an email he received from a disabled massage provider in London. She mailed the doctor immediately after hearing about the shooting, and expressed concern that people wouldn't understand about the increased F&F response that Pistorius would have as a disabled person. She explained that she, as a disabled person, has been attacked and that her F&F response is extreme now.

This is the point at which Nel objected. He says that a) it's hearsay, and they're not able to cross examine that witness and b) how another person might respond is not relevant to the case of how Pistorius did respond.

Oldwadge says that it's not hearsay and cited precedence, and that he wasn't using the testimony in the way Nel expressed anyway.

Masipa called for an early and longer lunch as she needs to read the case precedence that Oldwadge cited, and because she needs time to consider this.

And now we're all eating.

That's pretty much what I could pick up this morning, but once again, I'm working away in the background too.

After a delay, Masipa rules that the email about the masseurs disability is not relevant, inadmissible, and that it needs to be removed from the record.

Thanks for the summary Looking, been unable to catch up this morning & have found your summation more useful than Twitter.

Where is Roux?

Oh, just caught sight of him - why he's handed over to this personality vacuum is beyond me!

What the whole of the last half hour seems to boil down to is; people who are generally more anxious than others have less control over their reactions than people who are not so anxious. Pistorius was anxious, and as a person with a disability, he is more likely to be attacked than others. Therefore, his brain reacts differently to audio or visual stimulus.

It's the basis of the defence - he was so scared, he was unable to react otherwise.

The problem to my mind is; anxiety is hugely, massively common. It's common as a symptom of depression, which is also common, and it's common as a stand alone thing. The vast majority of people are able to put the breaks on before attacking physically. Some of us (me included) have a tendency to shout when we're in that situation, but most of us don't go so far as physically attacking.

And even when we do; it's not an excuse. I know he's not making it as an excuse, rather an explanation. I'm just saying; he's not alone, and he had access to many, many doctors if he wanted to do something about his anxiety before he acted out.

He almost attacked his washing machine, and didn't think 'huh, maybe I better do something about that before I actually shoot something I don't mean to.'

Though this mindless prattle doesn't actually go any way to expressing whether he knew it was Reeva in the bathroom or not. I remain set that he's culpable, but I don't know whether he knew it was her.

Sorry - no more time to stream this afternoon.

Hmm, thought yesterday it was only going one way, now it sounds like it's still uncertain.

Glad the email has been deemed inadmissible, it surely rubbished the findings of the month long psychological analysis OP has just had!?

I want to hear the summing up (when I will undoubtedly change my mind another seven or eight times), but I'm away from my computer tomorrow and Friday. I wonder how long they'll take. I would guess they'd at least start tomorrow after this witness.

I can understand OP feeling more vulnerable. I can understand him having a more extreme F&F response. But, I still struggle with his failure to check Reeva's whereabouts and ensure her safety.

I do think a lot has been made about the almost attack on the washing machine
I know a lot of people who have thought they have heard an intruder in the UK who have advanced toward it hammer/baseball bat/knife in hand only to find the cat knocked something off the counter
This doesn't show a greater or more heightened sense of anxiety.

We are paying a lot of attention to a tweet about something that might never have even happened.
He could have read another similar tweet, thought the guy sounded macho and tweeted something similar
His friend could have told him the story they all laughed and he tweeted it
He could have made it up to bolster an image he wanted to create about himself

He also didn't fire blindly through a door at the washing machine

I think It is only significant now because we want to find a reason for what happened. We also want to know the signs to protect others from outsiders and themselves.
I think this is especially true about OP. We don't want him to be guilty and if he is we want to mitigate it due to his disability and how others should have seen the signs and offered help.

His being more anxious because he was disabled is IMO simply nonsense and plays to the minds of us seeing disabled people as sweet, harmless or less than human. I don't believe this hugely fit Olympian felt even physically disabled or disadvantaged compared to many of us.

I think there was a toxic relationship between OP and Ms Steenkamp. It might simply have been two alphas vying for position or perhaps involved a damaged man needing to be worshipped and treated as an alpha and a woman not able to take on the role he demanded.

I think on the 13th he had bad news.
I think they rowed extensively, it escalated and he shot and killed her.
I cannot see how any other scenario fits.

I don't the washing machine issue helps OP. If the story is true (and I don't think it has been denied so I'd guess it was true as it's easy to put out a rebuttal) then yes it showed OP was vigilant to any possible attack; it showed he responded with a fight rather flight response but . . .and this is where I think it doesn't help him . . . he didn't fire because he made sure of his target first.

However it's also not relevant because the circumstances were different and OP's stress levels could have been different.

For what it's worth I'm not sure people want it to have been an accident because they feel sorry for OP. I'd much rather it had been an accident because it makes Reeva's last evening slightly more bearable for her family.

His being more anxious because he was disabled is IMO simply nonsense and plays to the minds of us seeing disabled people as sweet, harmless or less than human.

It bothers me for a number of reasons which I struggled to express yesterday.

If his defence is 'like most disabled people, I am much more likely to go into 'fight' rather than 'flight', then where are the thousands of disabled people who get into fights all the time?

If his defence is 'my neuro pathways are shorter due to anxiety, and therefore I went into 'fight' rather than 'flight'', then I'm concerned that this sets a bad precedence for the millions of people who struggle with anxiety, stress and depression.

From my own non-medical, non-academic background, I have witnessed people under stress acting badly. Not usually to the levels of physical violence, but people who would never have yelled before suddenly shout aggressively. I suppose the question becomes what we do about that?

I suppose my argument here still stands - yes, people under stress might well go for fight rather than flight. People who have been under stress might well have this as an instinct rather than retreat or curl up. But we still don't see masses and masses of people killing other people.

I have read in reports 'I saw red and shoved him!' or 'I saw red and threw the cup at the wall and it smashed.'

What bothers me about OP in relation to this, is that these aggressive shouts or shoves or throws are generally the work of a split second. They're not 'I walked across the room to pick up a cup and throw it.' There was enough time, certainly 30 seconds, perhaps even a minute, for some of the 'retreat' instinct to break through, but a fairly large amount of what he did suggests premeditation and not instinct - walking around to get the gun, bracing himself against the wall. Even when he shouted several times.

To my mind, these don't fit well with the explanation that it was a split-second instinctive reaction born from a lifetime of stress.

Why on earth didn't this Prof recommend treatment for this anxiety throughout his contact with OP preceeding the shooting if it was so marked?

I think this Professor's evidence and Nel's ability to cast doubt on it through cross-exam is going to be crucial.

He does this every time, Nel. Rips apart when they exactly put what into their report. I hate it, mainly because I know I wouldn't be able to answer that question about anything I had written over a period of time. I know it is crucial to the court, but it must be very easy to criticise every expert's report on this basis.