Oscar Pistorius breaks down as trial hears grisly details of girlfriend's killing

Oscar Pistorius breaks down as trial hears grisly details of girlfriend's killing

Credit: Getty Images

Oscar Pistorius breaks down as trial hears grisly details of girlfriend's killing


by Richard Allen Greene and Marie-Louise Gumuchian, CNN


Posted on March 6, 2014 at 10:25 PM

Pretoria, South Africa (CNN) -- Track star Oscar Pistorius broke down in court Thursday, the fourth day of his murder trial, as a neighbor described the grisly scenes when he tried to save the athlete's girlfriend after a fatal shooting on Valentine's Day 2013.

The amputee sprinter, 27, nicknamed "Blade Runner," has pleaded not guilty to all four counts against him, saying the killing of modelReeva Steenkamp, 29, was a tragic error and he mistook her for an intruder.

In graphic testimony, witness Johan Stipp, a doctor who lived close by, said he went to Pistorius' residence after hearing shots fired. He said he saw Steenkamp mortally wounded, her brain tissue mixed with blood and Pistorius praying for her to live.

"I remember the first thing he said when I got there was, 'I shot her, I thought she was a burglar and I shot her,' " Stipp told the court in Pretoria.

He said he had arrived and found Steenkamp's body lying at the bottom of the stairs. Pistorius was bent over her body with his left hand over her right groin and two fingers of his right hand in her mouth as he tried to clear her airway.




Stipp, who said he had trained in the army with assault rifles and 9 mm pistols -- the gun that killed Steenkamp -- said he had been surprised to hear no ambulance had been called when he arrived. He left after it did.


'He wanted her to live'



Roux said he had consulted three specialists and the autopsy and asked Stipp: "That person after the shots would not have been able to scream. That person would be nonresponsive, does that make sense to you as a medical doctor?"

"It does," Stipp replied.

The prosecution interjected, saying Steenkamp could have screamed after the first shot. Earlier in the week, prosecutor Gerrie Nel, reading a report from an expert, told the court that of the four bullets fired toward Steenkamp "the fourth bullet hit her in the head. She then died."


"He definitely wanted her to live, yes," Stipp replied. "He looked sincere to me. He was crying; there were tears on his face."


Witness grilled over notes

Earlier Roux had cross-examined another neighbor who testified that he heard shouting from Pistorius' house before the shooting.

Charl Johnson, husband of the trial's first witness, was back on the stand after the defense team wanted to retrieve notes he had taken in the weeks after the shooting. Roux grilled Johnson about the notes such as "the screams did not sound like fighting but more like the panic and distress calls of being attacked."



Defense pokes holes


faces Pistorius

Roux on Wednesday said he had no doubt that Johnson believed what he was saying -- but that whether what he was saying was true was a different question.



Johnson and his wife have testified to hearing shouts from Pistorius' house before a series of gunshots around 3 a.m. Johnson told investigators he and his wife didn't discuss their versions of events with each other. But on the stand, Johnson said he did discuss how many shots he and his wife heard and the timing of those shots.

"You and your wife could just as well have stood together in the witness box," Roux remarked. For witnesses to be considered reliable, they have to maintain independent versions of events, Roux said. "You failed, Mr. Johnson," he said.


Pleading not guilty


Pistorius pleaded not guilty Monday to one charge of murder and a firearms charge associated with Steenkamp's killing as well as the two gun indictments unrelated to her death.

The trial is expected to take at least three weeks.



Picture of a dream couple

Pistorius and Steenkamp were a young, attractive, high-profile couple popular in South Africa's social circles.

Pistorius, whose "Blade Runner" nickname reflects the special prostheses he uses while running, won six Paralympic gold medals and became the first double-amputee runner to compete in the Olympics, in London in 2012.

Cover girl Steenkamp, who was soon to star in a TV reality show, was on the cusp of becoming a celebrity in her own right. But on February 14, 2013, Steenkamp lay lifeless in a pool of blood on the floor of her boyfriend's house in an upscale gated community in Pretoria.


In court documents, Pistorius has said he heard a noise from the bathroom in the middle of the night and -- feeling vulnerable without his prosthetic legs on -- charged toward the bathroom on his stumps. He has said he shot through the toilet door to protect himself and Steenkamp.

"I felt a sense of terror rushing over me," he said in his court affidavit. "There are no burglar bars across the bathroom window, and I knew that contractors who worked at my house had left the ladders outside.





The case has put the spotlight on South Africa's rampant gun violence and high crime rates.


In 2012, more than half of South Africans told the country's police force they were afraid of having their homes broken into. In his affidavit, Pistorius said he had been the victim of violence and burglaries before, including death threats.