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Pistorius forced to look at police photograph of partner's bloodied head Pistorius forced to look at police photograph of partner's bloodied head
(about 3 hours later)
The chief prosecutor in Oscar Pistorius' murder trial on Wednesday urged the athlete to "take responsibility" for fatally shooting his girlfriend, telling him to look at a police photograph of Reeva Steenkamp's bloodied head that was displayed in court. Oscar Pistorius clashed angrily with a prosecutor who tried to force him to look at a gruesome photo of his girlfriend's bloodied head on Wednesday, exclaiming through tears: "I don't have to look at a picture, I was there."
Prosecutor Gerrie Nel said Steenkamp's head "exploded" when it was struck by one of four bullets Pistorius fired through a closed toilet door in his home last year. The photograph showed a side view of Steenkamp's head, with a mass of blood and human tissue on the back and upper parts. Her eyes were closed. The Paralympian went on to claim that he fired four shots into a toilet door at his home out of fear before he had time to think, not intending to kill anyone.
"It's time that you look at it," Nel said on the first day of cross-examination of the star athlete. The evidence was heard as prosecutor Gerrie Nel launched into his much anticipated cross-examination of Pistorius at the high court in Pretoria, South Africa. The 27-year-old maintains that he killed Reeva Steenkamp, a model and law graduate, after mistaking her for an intruder.
Pistorius said he didn't have to look because he was at the scene when Steenkamp died. Nel opened fiercely, asking the athlete to explicitly acknowledge that he killed Steenkamp. "You are a model for sportsmen, disabled and abled bodied sportsmen, all over the world?" Nel asked.
Nel set the stage for a rigorous cross-examination by demanding that Pistorius openly say he killed his girlfriend, sharply challenging him when he said he made a "mistake". "I think I was, my lady," replied Pistorius, answering to judge Thokozile Masipa. "I made a mistake."
The prosecutor asked the court for permission to show a video of the Olympic athlete firing a gun at a range and referring to its deadly power as a "zombie stopper". Defence lawyer Barry Roux objected to the gun video being shown, saying it was inadmissible character evidence and amounted to a legal "ambush" of the defence. Judge Thokozile Masipa allowed the video to be shown. "You killed a person, that's what you did," came the reply.
Pistorius, 27, has said he shot Steenkamp by accident on 14 February 2013, mistaking her for an intruder. The prosecution alleges he killed her on the early morning of Valentine's Day by firing through a closed toilet stall door after an argument. Pistorius faces a possible life sentence if convicted of premeditated murder. Pistorius said: "I made a mistake. My mistake was that I took Reeva's life."
Nel tried to dismantle the sympathetic image of Pistorius that the defence had sought to build up in three days of testimony. He opened by asking the athlete to explicitly acknowledge that he had killed Steenkamp. Nel responded: "You killed her. You shot and killed her. Won't you take responsibility for that?"
"I made a mistake," Pistorius said. Pistorius replied only: "I did."
"What was your mistake?" Nel shot back. The prosecutor went on to show a video, first broadcast on Sky News, of the athlete firing a gun at a watermelon and then saying it was "softer than brains" and calling the powerful .50-calibre handgun a "zombie stopper." As the melon disintegrates, Pistorius says off-camera: "It's a lot softer than brains. But... it's like a zombie stopper."
Pistorius then said he "took Reeva's life". Nel said to Pistorius: "You know that the same happened to Reeva's head? It exploded. I'm going to show you, Mr Pistorius, the exact same effect [caused by] the bullet that went into her head."
"You killed her," Nel said. "You shot and killed her," and he asked Pistorius to say it. Pistorius would not, saying merely: "I did." There was gasps in the courtroom as, without warning, multiple TV screens showed a police photo of Steenkamp's head, turned to the left with her eyes closed. There was a mass of tissue on the back and upper parts and her blonde hair was drenched dark with blood.
Earlier on Wednesday, Pistorius kicked at and swung a bat at the bullet-marked toilet door, which had been placed in the courtroom as evidence. It was a re-enactment of parts of the night when he killed Steenkamp. He said he tried to kick the door down with his prosthetic legs and then bashed it with a cricket bat, an attempt to show he had tried to help Steenkamp. Pistorius, his voice rising and starting to sob, said he was at the scene when Steenkamp died and knew of her terrible head injury.
Pistorius described what he said were the last moments of his girlfriend's life and how he dragged her, bleeding and "struggling to breathe" out of a toilet cubicle and downstairs to get help after shooting her in the head, arm and hip. But Nel insisted pitilessly: "That's it. It's time that you look at it. Have a look there, I know you don't want to because you don't want to take responsibility."
He said she died in his arms before paramedics arrived at his house. "I remember," Pistorius said, choking with emotion and looking away from a screen mounted on the witness stand. "I will not look at a picture where I'm tormented by what I saw and felt that night. As I picked Reeva up, my fingers touched her head. I remember. I don't have to look at a picture, I was there."
On Tuesday, Pistorius wept and wailed while describing the moments he said he realised he had fatally shot Steenkamp. Pistorius mostly kept his composure on Wednesday, though he often paused and his voice quavered while describing what he said were his desperate attempts to help Steenkamp after shooting her. As so often in the trial, Pistorius then descended into near hysterical crying, his hands over his face as he rocked from side to side, forcing an adjournment. His family, sitting the public gallery, were visibly appalled by Nel's aggressive approach and shook their heads in disgust.
"Reeva had died while I was holding her," Pistorius said after describing how he put his fingers in her mouth to try to help her breathe and put his hand on her hip to try to stop bleeding from one of several gunshot wounds. Nel went on to poke holes in details of Pistorius's version of the events in the early hours of 14 February last year. The runner conceded that his claim in a statement a year ago that he went out onto a balcony at his home before the shooting was incorrect. Pistorius said he went to the edge of the balcony but not outside.
He then questioned Pistorius about the moment he opened fire. The athlete described it as an "accident" and insisted that he had not intended to kill anyone, even an intruder. "I didn't have time to think," he said. "I just discharged my firearm.
"I didn't intend to shoot someone. I shot out of fear... I didn't intend to kill anyone... I didn't have time to think about what I was doing... Before thinking I fired four shots. When I realised the scale of what was happening I stopped firing."
Earlier, Pistorius described his frantic attempts to revive Steenkamp after he found her lying on the toilet floor and how she had died in his arms, her blood pouring over his body. "I checked to see if she was breathing and she wasn't," he said. "I could feel the blood was running down on me."
He called an ambulance but it was too late. "Reeva, Reeva had already died whilst I was holding her, before the ambulance arrived, so I knew there was nothing they could do for her."
He finished his answers to the defence by saying: "I did not intend to kill Reeva, my lady, or anyone else."
He faces a possible prison term of 25 years to life if convicted of murder.