Oscar retches during doc’s testimony

Paralympian Oscar Pistorius is seen at the North Gauteng High Court in Pretoria on the 6th day of his ongoing murder trial, Monday, 10 March 2014. The double amputee is accused of fatally shooting his girlfriend of few months Reeva Steenkamp at his home in the early hours of Valentines Day last year. Picture: Bongiwe Mchunu/Independent Newspapers Ltd/Pool

Paralympian Oscar Pistorius is seen at the North Gauteng High Court in Pretoria on the 6th day of his ongoing murder trial, Monday, 10 March 2014. The double amputee is accused of fatally shooting his girlfriend of few months Reeva Steenkamp at his home in the early hours of Valentines Day last year. Picture: Bongiwe Mchunu/Independent Newspapers Ltd/Pool

Published Mar 10, 2014

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Pretoria - Oscar Pistorius retched loudly in the dock as the cold details of tissue damage, bone fragments and lesions on his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp's body were given to the High Court in Pretoria on Monday.

“Mr Roux can you just attend to your client - I am not sure what's happening there,” said Judge Thokozile Masipa.

Pistorius had already been granted a short adjournment when he broke down as pathologist Professor Gert Saayman started going through the two-and-a-half page pathology report on Steenkamp's body after Pistorius shot her on February 14, 2013.

 

Just before a lunch break was called, Pistorius sat in the dock with his head bowed and his hands laced behind his neck.

He was shaking as Saayman described how a bullet entered Steenkamp's head in the right upper part, and ran under the skull before it exited from a second wound in the head.

Steenkamp family friend Desiree Myers also sat with her head down as Saayman spoke. Two women next to her held her hand and comforted her.

Pistorius sat gagging as Saayman said a bulk of the projectile went into the brain.

 

Saayman said Steenkamp's body was naked when it was brought in for a post mortem. Her clothes were brought along with the body.

Steenkamp's sport shorts had blood stains on them, and a small hole around 5mm in diameter.

What initially seemed like a defect on the trousers turned out to be a blood spatter, said Saayman.

A sleeveless black vest accompanied the pants.

Saayman said small tissue and bone fragments could be seen on the T-shirt.

Pistorius's sister, Aimee, also silently cried as she watched her brother break down.

Earlier his lawyer, Barry Roux, SC, called for an adjournment, which was granted.

 

His brother Carl and his sister Aimee came over to the dock to comfort the distraught Pistorius during the adjournment.

 

Judge Thokozile Masipa asked Roux if he would be able to proceed.

“He is very emotional. It is not going to change. May I approach him?” asked Roux.

He spoke to Pistorius and returned to face Masipa and said: “He says he is willing that the evidence must proceed.”

Saayman had successfully asked that his evidence not be broadcast live for the dignity of Steenkamp's family, or in case vulnerable people or children may hear or see it. He did not object to filtered or paraphrased reports such as those in the print media.

Masipa ordered that there be no live feed, Twitter, or blogging.

 

However, law expert Pierre de Vos said on Monday that Masipa’s order prohibiting the media from tweeting information about Steenkamp's post mortem results sounded unenforceable.

“I haven't heard the whole order, but from what I have heard it sounds confusing,” De Vos said.

“It sounds unenforceable. I wasn't there to hear her [the judge's] exact words, but in other court cases, people and journalists use Twitter so I don't know why they doing this in this case, what makes this case so special.”

 

Pistorius is on trial for the murder of Steenkamp.

He shot her dead through a locked bathroom door of his Pretoria home. He said he had mistaken her for an intruder.

The State, however, argues that it was premeditated murder. - Sapa

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