Oscar Pistorius Trial part 9

[JillJ72]

Starting a new thread as part 8 is nearly full, here - www.mumsnet.com/Talk/in_the_news/2080468-Oscar-Pistorius-Trial-Part-8

It's DV if you don't believe that story, NoMary.

He shot through the door because he thought his and Reeva's lives were in danger.

Mmm - that's why he shot through to door..

I wonder what sort of sentence Reeva would have got if she'd shot hero Oscar Pistorius through a locked door? I'd bet anything it would be more than 10 months.

He shot through the door because he though an intruder was on the other side. If I though someone was hiding there with a machete and I had a gun I would do the same.

Some of us don't believe that version, NoMary.

I certainly don't

A witness told the trial she woke to hear a woman screaming and a man shouting for help. She said that after the screams she heard four shots.

Oscar said thinking his girlfriend was still in bed, he shouted at Reeva to call the police. Why would she not have responded, shouted out, 3m away behind the bathroom door?

The prosecutor went on: "Are you sure that Reeva did not scream after the first shot?"

Mr Pistorius took a long time to answer, and broke down into sobs.

"At no point did Reeva shout out or scream," he said.

The evidence supports OPs story. A judge would not be swayed by OPs 'hero' status as a jury might. He was found guilty of manslaughter so hasn't got away with anything.

The so called arguing was proven not to have been audible from where it was said they were heard.

A great deal of OP's story seemed to hinge on him "screaming like a woman"

But witnesses head a man and a woman screaming. Then gun shots. I believe them.

Actually NoMary it would be more accurate to say that he said that was why he shot through the door. None of us have any idea why he shot through the door. We can all only guess.
Let's hope you never find yourself in that situation if you would also shoot through the door because if you're in the UK then your sentence would likely be heavier than OP's.

It beggars belief that some people still believe OP's version of events. Especially since the evidence didn't add up. At all.

The sentence would be about right for the charge if he was to serve the entire five years.

Seriously? Woken in the night witnesses were so alert and focused they clearly hear and sequenced the events as they described. Witnesses are notoriously inaccurate. The judge thought there was reasonable doubt about the testimonies of witnesses.

OP was undoubtedly reckless. Both on this night and previously but I do not see premeditated murder in these events just an awful set of circumstances resulting in death.

The evidence can support various scenarios: ultimately, OP and Reeva were there and she is dead.

His story doesn't conflict with the admitted evidence; other stories would also not conflict.

I'm not sure many are postulating pre-meditation...

The gun culture in the uk and in SA are totally different so it's a bit of an irrelevance

That's all the defence did - put enough "reasonable doubt" there. It doesn't mean Oscar didn't make up a pack of lies to fit the evidence at the scene.

It doesn't mean he lied either

The evidence supports OPs story except the evidence that doesn't like the fans, the duvet, the trousers on the floor, the blood splatter on the trousers and duvet; Reeva's stomach contents; the ear witnesses; the bath panel; the changing direction of the shots; the absence of a warning shout that he was armed; the absence of a warning shot; the lax security prior to that evening; Reeva's text saying she was scared, etc.

I swithered in the middle of the trial about whether I thought he knew it was Reeva. By the end I was convinced he did know it was Reeva but I didn't see how it could be proven if all witness statements from outside the property were dismissed and most internal evidence deemed circumstantial.

Imagine for a second he was lying . . .all the evidence would look exactly the same as it did. That's the problem I have with this case. The law isn't equipped to assess truth. It is only concerned with proof (as it should be) but that means the burden should lie differently when the only other witness is dead and the accused has everything to lose from admitting any guilt. Or, we accept, that in such cases it will only ever be a culpable homicide conviction and hope that the sentence is appropriate.

Her stomach contents suggested she'd eaten around two hours prior to death but Oscar said it was more like 7pm.
She had locked the bathroom door and taken her mobile phone with her.
What if she got to his place later than he would have liked, they rowed, she started packing to go, hence only her jeans left unpacked still inside out, he lost his temper and she went into the bathroom to get out of his face.

But it could have been a jumpy person with a history of letting guns go off who heard a bathroom window open and at once thought it was an intruder, with tragic consequences.

We'll never know.

No one will ever know for sure except OP. But because the evidence can be interpreted either way (they were also apparently very loving to one another) and OP does not come across as a cold blooded killer (reckless, immature, over reactive, yes) I think the verdict is right.

Screaming DV does not fit the facts.

WhoDaresWins. That was not the division that the judge made between the evidence though.

The division the judge made was to dismiss witness evidence in the case of the evidence against Pistorius on the grounds that witness evidence was inherently unreliable. Not because she thought they were too far away, she simply said, witness evidence is unreliable and we have moved beyond giving it much credence in a rule of law.

But 'I heard a scream' is a statement of fact. Yes you can argue that Pistorius has a girly voice or someone else screamed, but the witnesses were stating what they believed to be a fact, not their opinion. And multiple people claimed to have heard the same thing.

The evidence of the doctor, no matter how close in proximity he was, was much more unreliable because he was giving an opinion instead of stating a fact. Yet the judge unquestioningly accepted all of his testimony and it was one of the main reason she acquited Pistorius of one of the main charges against him. On the say so of that one persons opinion she declared his remorse was genuine without any other corroborating evidence.

Put it this way, have you ever interviewed for a job on a panel? After a candidate walks out of an interview you will have maybe five members of a panel sitting there and often they will all have completely differing opinions on the interviewee because of their own wants, concerns and preconceptions. Or if you go to an appointment with your husband to see a doctor, and you think they've patronised you, but their husband thinks they were just being nice.

This was exactly the same. There is no way of telling if another person in exactly the same situation would have testified differently. You can't simply accept that type of evidence because it is based on all kinds of preconceptions that are much less prevelant in factual evidence rather than subjective evidence.

Put it this way, a wealthy privileged Afrikaaner male is much more likely to identify and sympathise with someone else who is a wealthy privileged Afrikaaner male than his not very wealthy trophy girlfriend.

Who "screamed DV"? One poster mentioned she is at a DV conference.

It's a fact that a woman died a violent death at the hands of her boyfriend. It's a fact that she'd previously sent him a text saying he sometimes scared her.

She also sent a valentine card saying she loved him only hours before the incident.

I think it's perfectly possible to hurt someone recklessly in a rage and show remorse afterwards - the doctor's interpretation of OP's remorse could well be correct either way.