Oscar Pistorius trial: five key questions for the judge

It has been hard to avoid the Oscar Pistorius trial since it began two weeks ago. Almost every rhetorical flourish and stomach churn of the accused has been live-tweeted and beamed across the world, feeding our fascination with South Africa’s most famous athlete and the charges he faces.

The state says he murdered his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp on Valentine’s Day last year. Pistorius, a double amputee, says he fired four shots through a locked toilet door because he thought a burglar had entered his home through the window.

Over 100 witnesses could be called in total. And after two weeks, 13 have taken to the stand. But key arguments from the state prosecutors – and counter-arguments – are already taking shape. Here’s just some of the questions that Judge Thokozile Masipa and her two assessors will have to try and answer:

Does Oscar Pistorius scream like a girl?

There were chuckles in court when this was first raised, but it has turned out to be a serious point. Some of Pistorius’s neighbours have testified that they heard a woman screaming in terror on the night Steenkamp was killed. The state has argued that if they did, then why didn’t Pistorius? But the defence argues that they were in fact hearing Pistorius screaming in despair and horror at what he had done.

Michelle Burger, who lives 177 metres from Pistorius’s home, told the court she heard a woman’s “blood-curdling screams” at around 3am on the night in question, followed by gunshots. She added: “You only shout like that if your life was really threatened.”

But defence lawyer Barry Roux has argued that because Steenkamp was in a locked toilet, with a closed window, the sound of her screams would not have carried so far. Pistorius on the other hand, was in the next-door bathroom, with the window open, he argued, making it more likely that neighbours would have heard his screams.

The formidable Mr Roux raised his theory several times in his cross-examination of witnesses in week one of the trial, to varying success. Pistorius’s ex-girlfriend Samantha Taylor, who said she had heard him scream in anger on several occasions, dismissed any suggestion that he could sound like a woman. “I have heard him scream a few times,” Ms Taylor told the court. “It’s not true. He sounds like a man.”

Mr Roux countered that he had never been so distressed in the past.

Can a cricket bat hitting a door sound like a gunshot?

Another key element of the defence is that Pistorius breaking down the locked toilet door with a cricket bat sounded like gunshots – something that would back up their version of the sequence of events: Pistorius said he smashed down the door after firing the shots, when he realised that Steenkamp was most likely behind the door.

One keen crime scene analyst has put this to the test himself – albeit in a field, rather than an apartment. And Mr Roux even showed the video in court when cross-examining the forensic analyst, to try and back up his point.

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The defence lawyer appeared to gain ground with this theory during the cross-examination of a neighbour last Friday.

Dr Johan Stipp very lived close to Pistorius – he was on the scene soon after the shooting and saw Pistorius holding Steenkamp’s mortally wounded body in his arms – and said he heard two rounds of gunshots, with screams in between.

He is a medical doctor with military training, and came across as a credible witness. However Mr Roux pointed out that only four shots were fired on the night – something that everyone agrees on. And he argued that the second set of noises Dr Stipp heard was a cricket bat hitting the door, not gunshots.

Both the gunshots and the screaming show how important it will be for both the prosecution and the defence to establish a convincing timeline of events, matching sounds heard by witnesses, to incidents that happened on the night.

Was Pistorius wearing his prosthetic legs when he smashed the door?

Another potentially crucial element to factor into the timeline is when South Africa’s most famous athlete put on his prosthetic legs: specifically, whether it was before or after he picked up the cricket bat and smashed down the door.

His own version of events is as follows: he was on his stumps when he fired four shots through the toilet door. He realised Steenkamp was not in bed and that the toilet door was locked. That is when he put on his prosthetic legs, tried to kick open the door, before grabbing the cricket bat and smashing the door open.

When the forensic analyst took to the stand on day eight of the trial, he cast doubt on this sequence of events. Police Colonel Johannes Vermeulen wielded a bat in court – with Pistorius’s toilet door in court as a prop – to demonstrate his conclusion (see photo, right): that Pistorius was balanced on his stumps when he smashed the door with a cricket bat.

If the cricket bat was used before the shots were fired – something strenuously denied by the defence – this may back up the prosecution’s argument that Steenkamp’s death was murder, and she was killed by Pistorius in a fit of rage.

Were they arguing before she was killed?

Pistorius says the incident was a terrible mistake. In his bail hearing last year, he said of the night in question that he and Steenkamp were both in bed not long after 10pm: “We were deeply in love and I could not be happier. I know she felt the same way. She had given me a present for Valentine’s Day but asked me only to open it the next day.”

The charge brought against him by the prosecution is one of premeditated murder, which carries a 25 year prison sentence.

And if the couple were arguing shortly before the incident, that would appear to back up the prosecution’s case. One neighbour so far has appeared to back up their argument: Estelle van der Merwe, who lived less than 100 metres from Pistorius’s estate, said she was woken up to a couple arguing at around 2am.

She told court that she tried to drown out “loud voices” that went on for an hour by putting a pillow over her head. She then heard four shots fired at around 3am, followed by silence, and then a “commotion” and “someone crying out loudly”.

Defence Lawyer Barry Roux questioned what she heard, and when, again arguing that she lived too far away to have heard what she said.

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Why didn’t Pistorius call the police?

It is not unusual for South Africans living in a guarded estate to rely on private security over police. But prosectors have raised questions over why Pistorius even failed to call any security guards at his Silverwoods Estate after the shooting.

A security guard who was alerted to a shooting by neighbours and made his own call to Pistorius, testified that he had told him “everything was fine” over the phone.

The prosecution will argue, according to leaked court documents, that he used the time after the shooting to “fashion a defence, and phone his friends”, instead of calling for security, writes Debora Patta.

The defence has argued he was too distraught to think about calling the police. The first people on the scene have already described Pistorius’s confusion, and very emotional state. And his lawyers pointed out to phone records showing he did eventually make a call to Netcare, a private emergency response company, to seek medical assistance.

Who the judge believes, will be crucial.