Oscar Pistorius trial: the full story, day by day

Day 1: 3 March 2014

The start of the trial. Oscar Pistorius denied the premeditated murder of his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp, at his Pretoria home in the early hours of 14 February 2013.

• Pistorius pleaded not guilty to the murder and to firearms charges, telling the court he denies the allegations of murder “in the strongest terms” and believed an intruder had broken into his house and was in his bathroom when he fired.
  
• A witness told the trial that she heard “bloodcurdling screams” on the night the Paralympian shot his girlfriend dead. The witness, Michelle Burger, told the court she heard two people – a man and a woman – shouting, adding: “The fear in that woman’s voice; you only fear like that if your life is threatened.”
  
• Burger said she heard four gunshots on the night in question.
  
• Pistorius said he approached the bathroom with a gun in an effort to protect Steenkamp and accused the prosecution of trying to use inadmissible evidence for the “assassination of my character”, adding that suggestions he deliberately killed Steenkamp “could not be further from the truth”.

Day 1: live coverage as it happened.

Day 2: 4 March 2013

• Charl Johnson, a neighbour of the athlete, told the court he heard screams and four consecutive shots on the night in question. He said he had assumed that neighbours were being robbed, and had been surprised to learn the next day that Pistorius had shot Steenkamp.
  
• Johnson said that after realising how close their house was to the crime scene, he and his wife had chosen to speak to a lawyer rather than the police as they wanted to keep out of the public eye.
  
• Another witness, Johnson’s wife, Michelle Burger, again insisted that she heard the screams of a woman, rather than an anguished man. She rejected defence claims that the loud noises she heard coming from Pistorius’s house were the sound of him using a cricket bat to smash down the door of the bathroom.
  
• Burger disputed claims that she used her husband’s witness statement as a template for her own and denied basing her evidence on “retrospective knowledge” gleaned from later media coverage.
  
• The defence also sought to question Burger’s evidence by arguing that Steenkamp would have been too severely injured by gunshots to have been able to scream.
  
• Another neighbour, Estelle van der Merwe, told the court she woke to hear an argument and four noises – which could have been gunshots – on the night Steenkamp died.
  
• The judge reminded the media not to publish any images of witnesses after a TV channel and several papers carried a still photograph of one witness.
  

Day 2: live coverage as it happened.

Day 3: 5 March 2013

Along with the murder of Steenkamp, Pistorius also faced three firearms charges.

• Professional boxer Kevin Lerena, a friend of Pistorius, said the sprinter accidentally fired a gun in a restaurant and asked his friend to take the blame, in a separate firearms related charge. Jason and Maris Loupis, from the restaurant, said the group Pistorius was in was apologetic and left soon after the incident.
  

View image in fullscreen

• Chief defence lawyer Barry Roux sought to undermine the prosecution testimony of Michelle Burger and Charl Johnson, neighbours of Pistorius on the Silver Woods estate, who say they heard screams before shots were fired on the night the athlete fatally shot his girlfriend. Roux argued that similarities in the Burger’s and Johnson’s accounts indicated that they had conferred over their answers, which Johnson denied.
  
• Prosecutor Gerrie Nel said Johnson’s telephone number had been read out in court a day earlier by Roux and he had received a “large amount” of calls and a threat which said: “Why are you lying in court? You know Oscar didn’t kill Reeva. It’s not cool.”
  

Day 3: live coverage as it happened.

Day 4: 6 March 2014

• The defence’s Barry Roux asked witness Charl Johnson about the discrepancies between his first and second accounts of the events on the night of the shooting. Roux suggested that the sounds Johnson heard after screams were Pistorius’s cricket bat breaking down his bathroom door, and not gunshots.
  
• Prosecutor Gerrie Nel and Roux both questioned witness Johan Stipp, Pistorius’s neighbour and a doctor, about his recollection of the sequence of events on the night of the shooting. Stipp’s said he heard gunshots and screams from his bedroom.
  
• Roux suggested that Pistorius, anxious and distressed, could have produced the screams that Stipp identified as female.
  

Day 4: live coverage as it happened.

Day 5: 7 March 2014

• Defence lawyer Barry Roux and prosecutor Gerrie Nel questioned Pistorius’s ex-girlfriend, Samantha Taylor, who spoke about her experience of his use of firearms and the sound of his screams. Court was adjourned twice after Taylor broke down in tears, when Roux asked her about the end of her relationship with Pistorius.
  
• Witness Pieter Baba, a security guard on duty the night of Steenkamp’s death, testified what he saw and heard from neighbours and in Pistorius’s house after the gunshots were fired. Baba said that Pistorius tearfully told him “everything is fine” after neighbours reported hearing gunshots fired in Pistorius’s house.
  

Day 5: live coverage as it happened.

View image in fullscreen

Day 6: 10 March 2014

Judge Thokozile Masipa blocked live tweeting and broadcasting of the testimony of Gert Saayman, who conducted the autopsy on Steenkamp. Masipa said Saayman’s testimony would have an “explicitly graphic nature” and should not be shown around the world.

The forensic pathologist said Pistorius had used an expanding bullet designed to cause maximum tissue damage when he opened fire through a locked toilet door. Pistorius was bent double in the dock, hands on his ears as if trying to block out the words, and violently sick.

Day 7: 11 March 2014

The court heard more details of the charges that Pistorius fired a gun through a car sunroof in November 2012 and in a crowded restaurant in January 2013:

• Pistorius was said to have clashed with a police officer who picked up his firearm, telling him, “You can’t just touch another man’s gun.” Soon after, he fired the weapon through the roof of a car in which he was travelling and laughed about it, his former friend Darren Fresco testified.
• Fresco described another shooting incident in a restaurant in Johannesburg in January 2013. He said he handed his gun, a Glock 27 .40-calibre pistol, under the table to Pistorius. But the gun went off. “Instantly he passed the weapon back to me, under the table, and he said, ‘Please, there’s too much media hype around me at the moment, please can you take the rap?’” he said. “Being a friend I said I would, with pleasure.”
• State pathologist Gert Saayman said food in Steenkamp’s stomach suggested she had eaten at about 1am, two hours before she died, raising questions over Pistorius’s testimony that the couple went to bed at 10pm.

Day 8: 12 March 2014

• A forensic expert said Pistorius was not wearing his prosthetic legs, as he claimed, when he beat down his bathroom door with a cricket bat after shooting Reeva Steenkamp. Johannes Gerhard Vermeulen said if he had been on his prostheses, the position at which he broke through the door would have been “unnatural and uncomfortable”. Pistorius’s defence lawyer said the athlete would have been unable to balance on his stumps while using the bat.
  
• Vermeulen did endorse Pistorius’s account that the shooting through the door came before the bat was used.
• The prosecution confirmed it accepted Pistorius’s claim that he was not on his prostheses when he fired the shots that killed Steenkamp.

Day 9: 13 March 2014

• Gruesome images of Steenkamp shortly after her death were inadvertently shown to the packed courtroom, causing Pistorius to vomit and horrifying her supporters in the public gallery.
  
• The photographs flashed up briefly on several TV screens as a police official flicked through images on a computer showing scenes from inside Pistorius’s house.
  

Day 10: 14 March 2014

View image in fullscreen

• Police photographs of a bare-chested Pistorius standing on blood-stained prosthetic legs and wearing shorts covered in blood, taken shortly after the athlete fatally shot his girlfriend, were shown to the court.
  
• A damning portrait of South African police was painted, as the defence claimed two luxury wristwatches worth thousands of pounds went missing from the athlete’s bedroom on the day he was arrested.
• Former police colonel Schoombie van Rensburg said he saw a ballistics expert at the scene examining without gloves the firearm used to kill Steenkamp.

Day 11: 17 March 2014

• Sean Rens, manager of a firearms training academy south of Johannesburg, told the court that Pistorius “had a great love and enthusiasm” for firearms.
  
• Licensing examination records reveal that Pistorius knew the country’s gun laws well. He achieved top marks in competency tests, which included a question about whether he could fire at burglars stealing a television from his house. Pistorius wrote: “No. Life is not in danger.”
• Rens also recalled an incident when Pistorius told him he thought there was an intruder in his home: “He went into what we call ‘code red’, or combat mode, in other words to draw his gun and go and clear his house. When he came to the source of the noise, it was the laundry or something.” Pistorius had tweeted about the incident in November 2012: “Nothing like getting home to hear the washing machine on and thinking its an intruder to go into full combat recon mode into the pantry!”
• Steenkamp’s mother June attended the trial for the first time since its opening day. She was greeted by Pistorius and acknowledged him with a nod; Pistorius’s sister Aimee also walked over to speak to her.

View image in fullscreen

Day 12: 18 March 2014

• Police captain Chris Mangena said Pistorius was standing on his stumps nearly three metres from a locked toilet door when he opened fire and killed his girlfriend.
• Mangena testified that, of the four bullets fired, one had missed Steenkamp and ricocheted off a wall before hitting another wall in the cubicle. The other three hit her.

Day 13: 19 March 2014

• Police ballistics expert Chris Mangena said Steenkamp was standing in a toilet cubicle facing the locked door when she was hit in the right hip by the first of the four bullets. Steenkamp then slumped into a “seated or semi-seated position” on top of a magazine rack. The second bullet missed her and ricocheted off the wall, bruising her back. Steenkamp was hit in her right arm and in the head by the third and fourth shots. She collapsed with her head on the toilet seat.
• He also described the impact of the type of bullets in Pistorius’s gun, which were designed to cause maximum damage. “It hits the target, it opens up, it creates six talons, and these talons are sharp. It cuts through the organs of a human being.”
  
• Pistorius looked at pornographic and car websites on his iPad in the hours before he shot and killed Steenkamp.

Day 14: 24 March 2014

• Police mobile phone expert Francois Moller read out WhatsApp messages between Steenkamp and Pistorius, in which she told her boyfriend: “You have picked on me excessively … I do everything to make you happy and you do everything to throw tantrums. I’m scared of you sometimes and how you snap at me and of how you will react to me. You make me happy 90% of the time and I think we are amazing together … I’m the girl who fell in love with you but I’m also the girl who gets side-stepped when you are in a shit mood … I get snapped at and told my accent and voices are annoying.”
• Despite the evidence of a volatile relationship, Moller said: “Ninety percent [of all the messages] were normal conversations and loving conversations.”
• Anette Stipp, a neighbour of Pistorius, testified that she heard gunshots, the “terrified, terrified” screams of a woman and then a second set of gunshots on the night of the shooting.

Day 15: 25 March 2014

The state finished its case.

• Prosecution witness Colonel Gerhard Vermeulen was recalled by the defence to answer questions about a “new” mark at the top of the toilet door and admitted he had not checked it against the cricket bat used by Pistorius.
  
• The prosecution detailed calls made to and from Pistorius’ phones on the night of Steenkamp’s death, which showed that after alerting security guards and the ambulance service he rang his friend, his brother and his manager. An expert witness agreed that a call to Pistorius’ own voicemail had probably been made accidentally.
• Police warrant officer Adriaan Maritz told the court the police computer system had no record of Pistorius ever reporting a crime or being the victim of one, as both sides tried to paint a picture of Pistorius’ fear (or otherwise) of being attacked in his home.
  
• Texts and WhatsApp exchanges between the couple were read to the court, and CCTV images of the pair showed them kissing as they shopped for groceries. The defence said that of over 1,700 messages, the prosecution had found only four that showed rows.
  

Day 15: live coverage as it happened.

Day 16: 28 March 2014

The trial was adjourned after one of the judge’s assessors – without whom the court could not proceed – fell ill.

Day 16: live coverage as it happened.

Day 17: 7 April 2014

The defence opened its case and Pistorius took to the witness stand.

• He began with a tearful, broken-voiced apology to the family and friends of Steenkamp, saying there is “not a moment” when he does not think about her family, and prays for them daily. He added: “I’ve tried to put my words on paper many times to write to you but no words would ever suffice”
• Pistorius said he had taken anti-depressants and sleeping pills since the shooting, often waking with “terrible nightmares”. He said he often calls his sister to sit with him during the night.
• He said his religious faith was the only thing to sustain him over the past year: “There have been times when I’ve just been struggling a lot. My God is a God of refuge.”
  
• Pistorius spoke at length about his fear about, and experience of, crime. He said his his mother was worried about intruders and kept a pistol under her pillow. He said a speedboat accident in 2009 which almost killed him left him fearful and withdrawn.
• The first defence witness was pathologist Professor Jan Botha, who questioned prosecution evidence that Steenkamp must have eaten about two hours before her death at 3am. Pistorius spent much of this evidence with his hands over his face, retching.

Day 17: live coverage as it happened.

Day 18: 8 April 2014

The court adjourned early after the defence said Pistorius was too emotional to continue his testimony.

• Pistorius said he grabbed the gun he always kept under the bed when he heard a noise in the night. He was terrified that intruders had come into the house and shouted for Steenkamp to call the police.
  
• He said he heard a noise from inside the toilet. “Before I knew it I had fired four shots at the door.”
• He broke down as he described finding Steenkamp inside the bathroom, not breathing.
  
• The athlete removed his prosthetic legs in court and stood by the toilet door, which had been brought to the court room to demonstrate the shooting.
• He denied ever firing a gun through a car sunroof, and said the incident in which a firearm he was holding went off in a restaurant was an accident.

Day 18: live coverage as it happened.

Day 19: 9 April 2014

Pistorius was cross-examined by state prosecutor Gerrie Nel.

• Pistorius was shown a photograph of his dead girlfriend, with Nel telling him: “You shot and killed her. Won’t you take responsibility for that?” In tears, the athlete replied: “I don’t have to look at a picture, I was there.”
• As the prosecutor tore holes in the defence version of events, Pistorius told the judge: “My memory isn’t very good at the moment. I’m under a lot of pressure sitting here. It’s not easy. I’m defending for my life.”
• He described the moment he fired the gun: “Before thinking, out of fear, I fired four shot … I didn’t intend to shoot anyone. I fired my firearm before I could think, before I even had a moment to comprehend what was happening. I believed someone was coming out the toilet.”
• Nel showed a video of Pistorius firing a gun at a watermelon and saying off-camera: “It’s a lot softer than brains. But … it’s like a zombie stopper.”

Day 19: live coverage as it happened.

Day 20: 10 April 2014

Pistorius continued to face ferocious cross-examination from Nel.

• He admitted that he had “no reason” to fire the shots that killed Steenkamp, as Nel told him: “Your version is so improbable, that nobody would ever think it’s reasonably, possibly true, it’s so impossible … Your version is a lie.”
• Nel said the phrase “I love you” appeared only twice in WhatsApp messages from Steenkamp and, on both occasions, they were written to her mother: “Never to you and you never to her.”

Day 20: live coverage as it happened.

Day 21: 11 April 2014

• Pistorius asserted that when he entered the bathroom he shouted to Steenkamp to call the police, so Nel demanded to know why she did not respond, describing it as the “most improbable” part of his story.
• Nel alleged that the couple had an argument and Steenkamp fled to the toilet pursued by Pistorius. “She wasn’t scared of an intruder. She was scared of you.”
• Pistorius insisted that Steenkamp did not scream when the bullets hit her.
• Pistorius, who repeatedly rubbed eyes that looked sore, said: “I’m tired, my lady.” The judge told him: “So if you are tired and the reason you are making all these mistakes is because you are tired, you must say so.” The court adjourned early.

Day 21: live coverage as it happened.

Day 22: 14 April 2014

Pistorius saw his fourth day of bruising cross-examination.

• Nel accused the defendant of deliberately breaking down into tearful histrionics to avoid difficult questions.
• Pistorius wept as he recalled shouting at the presumed intruder: “Get the fuck out of my house! Get the fuck out of my house!”
• Nel told him: “You fired at Reeva. These other versions cannot work: you fired at her, you did. Why are you getting emotional now?” Pistorius wailed through tears: “I did not fire at Reeva!”
• The prosecutor accused Pistorius of changing his defence from putative self-defence to involuntary action, when the athlete said he had not had time to think before firing his gun.

Day 22: live coverage as it happened.

Day 23: 15 April 2014

The cross-examination of Pistorius came to an end and he was re-examined by Roux:

• Pistorius was asked about a Valentine’s card that Steenkamp had intended to give him on 14 February 2013, the day she died. He told the court: “The envelope says ‘Ozzie’, with some hearts and a squiggle, and then it says on the front of the card: ‘Roses are red, violets are blue’. Then on the inside she wrote the date on the left, then on the right she said: ‘I think today is a good day to tell you that … I love you.’”

• Nel summed up the state’s case, saying that Steenkamp ate around two hours before her death, when the couple had an argument that was heard by a neighbour. She locked herself in the toilet and screamed. Pistorius then took his pistol and fired through the door as the two talked, even changing his aim when she fell backwards.
  
• Pistorius remained vague on whether he consciously pulled the trigger in self-defence or if it went off involuntarily. “I didn’t think about pulling the trigger,” he said. “As soon as I heard the noise, I pulled the trigger.”
• He also stood in the middle of the court re-enacting the moment he struck the toilet door with a cricket bat to reach Steenkamp. He said he was “heartbroken” when he first saw Steenkamp’s body.

Day 23: live coverage as it happened.

Day 24: 16 April 2014

• Roger Dixon, an expert witness for Oscar Pistorius’s defence, was accused of “irresponsibility” after admitting he was not trained in ballistics, light, sound or blood spatter evidence and was not present at Steenkamp’s postmortem.
• Dixon presented a different order of the shots that killed Steenkamp and claimed that a bruise on her right buttock was caused by her falling back on a magazine rack, contradicting the finding of state pathologist Gert Saayman.

Day 25: 17 April 2014

• Nel assailed Dixon again over a test he conducted to see if Pistorius’s head and body could have seen by neighbours through a bathroom window on the night of the killing. Dixon admitted using a man on his knees who was 20cm shorter than the double amputee athlete on his stumps.

Day 26: 5 May 2014

• After a two-week break, the defence picked up its case with two witnesses who were first on the scene after Pistorius shot Steenkamp: Johan Stander and his daughter Carice Viljoen. The defence queried why – despite being interviewed as witnesses for the state – neither were called by the prosecution.
  
• Stander revealed details of the call Pistorius made to him immediately after the shooting: “Johan, please, please, come to my house, please. I shot Reeva. I thought she was an intruder. Please, please come quick.”
  
• Both testified that they had arrived at Pistorius’ house to find him carrying a bleeding Steenkamp down the stairs and that the athlete was crying, screaming and begging for help.
• Both Stander and Viljoen gave evidence of several people – neighbours, friends, police in uniform and civilian clothes – entering and leaving the house. Viljoen said nobody was controlling who came and went. The defence alleges that crucial evidence in Pistorius’ bedroom was tampered with by police officers.
  
• Stander, who had been on the management committee for the estate, recounted several instances of breaking-and-entering crimesthere, including via a ladder. Nel insisted the estate was a safe place to live.
  

Day 26: live coverage as it happened.

Day 27: 6 May 2014

The court heard from three of Pistorius’ closest neighbours, none of whom were called by the state.

• The three witnesses all heard a man crying on the night Steenkamp was shot and that it was a “high-pitched cry”. The defence claims that prosecution witnesses who previously told the court they heard a woman’s scream had in fact heard Pistorius, who it says screams like a woman when distressed. Michael Nhlengethwa said the man’s cry was “very high”.
  
• The two female witnesses, Eontle Nhlengethwa and Rika Motshuane,
  
• were asked by the defence to replicate the cry they heard that night. Each made a high-pitched, anguished scream. All three testified that they did not hear a woman screaming.
  
• Michael Nhlengethwa told the court Pistorius introduced Steenkamp to him as “my fiancée” days before she was killed and said he would be moving to Johannesburg to be closer to her.
  
• Pistorius was later accused of trying to intimidate Kim Myers, a friend of Reeva Steenkamp who was in court, by asking: “How can you sleep at night?” He denied the accusation.

Day 27: live coverage as it happened.

Day 28: 8 May 2014

• Ballistics expert Thomas ‘Wollie’ Wolmarans, told the court that the ammunition used to shoot Steenkamp was not Black Talon bullets, as previously heard, but ranger bullets. The “mushroom” effect on flesh is the same. Tests he carried out on wood splintering indicate Steenkamp was very close behind the door when she was shot.
• Social worker and probation officer Yvette Van Schalkwyk was a late addition to the witness list, coming forward only on Tuesday to dispute allegations that Pistorius was “putting on a show” with his emotional outbursts in court. The social worker was assigned to support Pistorius from his earliest court appearances. But Nel argued he was sorry only for himself, and not for what he had done.
• Anaesthetist Professor Christina Lundgren cast doubt on the state’s claims that Reeva Steenkamp must have eaten no more than two hours before her death, claiming that gastric emptying was “not an exact science”. She described the post-mortem report that concluded Steenkamp had eaten at 1am or later as “purely speculative”.

Day 28: live coverage as it happened.

Day 29: 9 May 2014

• Wolmarans continued his evidence, testifying that Steenkamp was standing close behind the toilet door when the first two bullets hit her hip and arm, and was falling as she was hit by a subsequent bullet that caused her head wound. He said an injury to Steenkamp’s back was not caused by a ricochet bullet, as the state argues, but occurred when she fell backwards on to a wooden magazine rack, claiming: the state’s version “doesn’t make sense”.

View image in fullscreen

• After decibel tests to ascertain whether a cricket bat striking the door could be mistaken for gunshots, Wolmarans concluded the sounds of the cricket bat and gunshots were very similar. But this evidence was undermined by Wolmarans’ insistence that he was not a sound expert and references to his hearing loss and tinnitus.
  
• Nel queried Wolmarans’ assertion that the bullets used to shoot Steenkamp were not black talons, as had been previously reported, but ranger bullets. Captain Mangena, the state ballistic expert, maintains the bullets were Black Talons. Pistorius did not dispute this when he gave his evidence.
  

Day 29: live coverage as it happened.

Day 30: 12 May 2014

A dramatic day, as the prosecution announced that it would ask that Pistorius undergo a mental health assessment at a state hospital.

• The surprising move came after defence witness and forensic psychiatrist Dr Merryll Vorster said Pistorius suffered from generalised anxiety disorder at the time of the shooting, and a depressive disorder following it. The anxiety disorder – which stemmed from surgery at the age of 11 months to remove his lower legs – could make Pistorius a danger to society, she said.
  
• Barry Roux said the defence would oppose the application – to be made under section 78 of the Criminal Procedure Act – and said the athlete’s diagnosis of generalised anxiety disorder did not mean he was incapable of distinguishing right from wrong.
• Pistorius’s physical vulnerability made him more anxious, said Vorster. Since childhood, Pistorius was encouraged not to see himself as disabled, which meant he was unable to access the emotional support he needed, Vorster said.
• His anxiety disorder left him “hypervigilant” about his personal safety. His mother, who died when Pistorius was 14, slept with a firearm under her pillow and had an irrational fear of intruders.

Day 30: live coverage as it happened.

Day 31: 13 May 2014

The state made a formal application to have Pistorius sent to a mental health hospital for 30 days for evaluation.

• Making the application, Nel said the court had no choice but to refer Pistorius. But Nel said the state did not make the case that Pistorius was mentally ill. The court is obliged to “act decisively” because of the evidence of the defence’s psychiatrist, Dr Merryll Vorster, who diagnosed him with generalised anxiety disorder, which might have affected his actions on the night he shot Steenkamp. If the court chooses not to refer, it could have a bearing on a future appeal.
  
• The defence strongly opposed the application, with Roux describing the prosecution move as “a ruse”. There were no grounds to support the allegation that generalised anxiety disorder is a mental illness.
• Nel said the defence had wanted to use the diagnosis of generalised anxiety disorder as “a fall-back option” after Pistorius performed poorly in the witness box.

Day 31: live coverage as it happened.

Day 32: 14 May 2014

• Judge Masipa ruled that Pistorius must be referred for psychiatric evaluation following evidence that his actions may have been affected by an anxiety disorder.
  
• Masipa said the lay court was “ill-equipped” to decide whether the diagnosis ought to be taken into account, and referring Pistorius for psychiatric tests would ensure a fair trial.

Day 32: live coverage as it happened.

Day 33: 20 May 2014

• Judge Masipa set out the terms of Pistorius’s mental health evaluation, agreed with both state and defence in advance. Pistorius would spend 30 days as an outpatient at Weskoppies state psychiatric hospital in Pretoria, beginning on Monday 26 May, attending every weekday between 9am and 4pm
• The trial was adjourned until 30 June.

Day 33: live coverage as it happened.

Day 34: 30 June 2014

• The report from a panel of mental health experts concluded that Pistorius was not suffering from a “mental disorder or defect” when he shot Reeva Steenkamp, and was not incapable of telling right from wrong, or of acting on that understanding of right and wrong.
• The court did not hear if the psychiatrists support the diagnosis of generalised anxiety disorder. But the panel did conclude the athlete suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder and depression.
  
• Defence acoustics expert Ivan Lin said screams from the locked toilet were ‘unlikely’ to be heard in neighbours’ bedrooms 177m away, contradicting testimony from a state witness. He said it was not always possible to tell whether a scream was made by a man or a woman.
  
• The surgeon who amputated Pistorius’ legs as a baby said the athlete would be “severely impaired” in a dangerous situation, and would be unable to flee if on his stumps. The judge was asked to examine Pistorius on his stumps in the courtroom; this was not filmed.
• Judge Masipa has said she is “very unhappy” at the state’s failure to produce an electrical cord that was in Pistorius’ bedroom on the night of the shooting. The cord appeared in police photographs but was not listed on an inventory of items removed from the house.

Day 34: live coverage as it happened.

Day 35: 1 July 2014

• Pistorius’ manager, Peet van Zyl, told the court that the athlete had asked that event organisers arrange for Steenkamp to accompany him on two of his athletics trips. He had never asked this of any other girlfriend.
• Nel cited a report that a room-mate of Pistorius at the London 2012 Paralympic games asked to move because the athlete was constantly on the phone arguing. Van Zyl said he had seen Pistorius lose his temper only twice, in the face of “abusive” questioning from journalists.
• Pistorius was due to retire from athletics in 2017, but his financial position was very strong after his performance in London in 2012.

Day 35: live coverage as it happened.

View image in fullscreen

Day 36: 2 July 2014

• The report by Weskoppies hospital’s lead psychologist Jonathan Scholtz concluded that Pistorius has been severely traumatised by the events of 14 February 2013, suffering depression and post-traumatic stress disorder, and “his condition is likely to worsen” if he does not continue mental health treatment, leading to an increased risk of suicide. There is no evidence of narcissism, psychopathy, abnormal aggression or explosive anger, and his relationship with Reeva Steenkamp shows no evidence of abuse. But the report says Pistorius does not meet the requirements for a diagnosis of generalised anxiety disorder.
• Professor Wayne Derman, sports physician for the South African national teams, testified to the high levels of stress he had recorded in Pistorius, compared with other elite disabled athletes. Disabled individuals can have an “exaggerated” fight-or-flight response, he said.
• Peet Van Zyl, Pistorius’ manager, was challenged over claims that Steenkamp was the first girlfriend invited to accompany Pistorius to overseas athletics events. The prosecution alleged that Pistorius had attempted to take a previous partner, Samantha Taylor, to the London 2012 Olympics.

Day 36: live coverage as it happened.

Day 37: 3 July 2014

• The defence revealed more details of the psychological profile, which concluded that Pistorius has a split personality that has led to the formation of “two Oscars” – one a vulnerable and fearful person with a disability, the other a confident Olympic hero.

Day 38: 7 July 2014

• Nel quizzed sports physician Wayne Derman about Pistorius’ mobility when on his stumps – but a video showing the athlete re-enacting his version of how he shot Steenkamp then carried her from the bathroom was not mentioned in court. The Australian TV channel that aired the footage insisted it did not believe it was obtained illegally.

Day 38: live coverage as it happened.

Day 39: 8 July 2014

The defence rests its case.

• Barry Roux, lead counsel for Pistorius, said the defence had had to abandon efforts to get some witnesses to testify, because they did not want their voices broadcast “around the world”.

Day 39: live coverage as it happened.

Day 40: 7 August 2014

The court heard closing arguments by the prosecution.

• Fetching the gun and walking down the corridor to the bathroom with it showed premeditation, the state claimed. Nel said Pistorius was an “appalling witness” whose testimony had been “devoid of truth”, vague, argumentative and mendacious. He did not have an anxiety disorder but “anxiety on-call”.
• The prosecutor highlighted what he called significant incongruities in the defence case, arguing that conflicting evidence about the position of fans and a duvet in the accused’s bedroom proved Pistorius was tailoring his evidence to mask the fact that he knew it was Steenkamp in the toilet cubicle when he fired four shots through the door. There is no proof the police tampered with the crime scene, Nel said. The position of items in the bedroom means Pistorius’ version cannot be true.
• Regardless of who was behind the door, Pistorius is guilty of murder,Nel argued.Whether Pistorius believed the person behind the door was an intruder or knew it was Steenkamp, it was murder by dolus directus (premeditated murder) or dolus eventualis (that he must have known he was likely to kill the person by firing). He meant to fire and he aimed at the person in the cubicle.
• Nel insisted Pistorius knew it was Steenkamp. She was facing the door when he fired directly at her – not wild shooting, but a “good grouping” of four shots. He said WhatsApp messages between the pair show they were having problems, with Steenkamp saying she was “scared” of her boyfriend.
• The prosecution contended that the pair were arguing. A witness says she heard a row, another saw the bathroom light on andSteenkamp’s stomach contents indicate she was awake and eating several hours after Pistorius said they had gone to sleep.
• State witnesses who said they heard a woman showed “extraordinary corroboration” in their independent statements to police. Witnesses also heard “intermingling” screams of a man and a woman.
• The other charges faced, and denied, by Pistorius show a pattern of behaviour in which the athlete acts recklessly and does not take responsibility for his actions, the state argued.
  

Day 40: live coverage as it happened.

Day 41: 8 August 2014

The defence wrapped up its final arguments and Judge Masipa announced that she would deliver her verdict on 11 September.

• Barry Roux compared Pistorius’ years of disability to an abused women who snaps and kills her husband. Questioned by the judge, Roux said the shooting was a reflexive action after a “slow burn” of vulnerabilities led to a point at which he had “had enough”.
• Roux says the trial should have begun with a charge of culpable homicide rather than murder.
• The defence said Pistorius should be acquitted. If the firing of the gun was purely reflexive, he lacked criminal capacity; if there was a thought process, it was “putative private defence” (self-defence) because he believed he was in danger. He had no motive to kill Steenkamp.
• The defence took the court in detail through the timeline of events in an attempt to prove the state’s version – in which the fatal shots were fired at 3.17am – could not be true. The defence said the noises heard at 3.17am were the thuds of the cricket bat, which means the screams heard before 3.17am were made by the accused, not by Steenkamp, who was already fatally wounded.
• Roux accused state witnesses of lying to the court and alleged that police had disturbed the scene.
• Roux said Pistorius should be found guilty of a separate charge of negligently discharging a firearm in a restaurant.
• Prosecutor Gerrie Nel said Pistorius’ two defences – putative self-defence and that he fired involuntarily – were not just mutually exclusive but mutually destructive.

Day 41: live coverage as it happened.

The case for the state and the defence – in summary.

Day 42: 11 September 2014

Judge Masipa, in the first day of her judgment, effectively ruled out the possibility that Pistorius would be found guilty of murder.

• The judge said the state had failed to prove premeditated murder and the evidence was “purely circumstantial”. He will also not be found guilty of murder without premeditation (dolus eventualis), as Masipa says there was not sufficient evidence to suggest that he had foreseen that his actions could result in the death of the person behind the toilet door.
• Nonetheless, Masipa said it was clear that Pistorius had acted unlawfully in shooting the person behind the door. A reasonable person would not have fired four shots into the toilet cubicle, because he would have foreseen the consequences: that somebody could be killed.
  
• Pistorius acted “too hastily and used excessive force … It is clear his conduct was negligent.” But the judge adjourned the hearing for the day before delivering what many observers in and outside the court expected to be a guilty verdict on the charge of culpable homicide (manslaughter).
  

More detail of the judgment, which explain the judge’s conclusions, is here, and a summary of key quotes from the judge is here.

Day 42: live coverage as it happened.

Day 43: 12 September 2014

Oscar Pistorius was found guilty of culpable homicide for shooting dead Reeva Steenkamp.

• But he was formally cleared of charges of murder – premeditated or not.
  
• Despite objections from the state, Judge Thokozile Masipa agreed with an application by the defence to extend bail for Pistorius until sentencing on 13 October.
  
• Masipa found Pistorius not guilty of two further firearms charges: that he fired a gun through a car sunroof, and that he was in possession of illegal ammunition. But he was found guilty of negligently discharging a loaded gun in a crowded restaurant just weeks before he shot Steenkamp.
• In a statement made in court after the verdicts, Arnold Pistorius, the athlete’s uncle, said the judgment had lifted “a big burden” from the family, but insisted there were “no victors … in this devastating tragedy”.
  
• The International Paralympic Committee said Pistorius would be allowed to compete in future sporting events.
• South Africa’s National Prosecuting Authority said it was “disappointed” by the verdicts.

Day 43: live coverage as it happened.

View image in fullscreen

Day 44: 13 October 2014

The beginning of the sentencing hearing, and five days of arguments in mitigation and aggravation from defence and state.

• Pistorius’s defence team called three witnesses to testify in mitigation of sentencing. Social worker Joel Maringa told the court that he recommended Pistorius undergo house arrest for three years, with 16 hours ofcommunity service a month.
  
• The state’s Gerrie Nel called this suggestion “shockingly inappropriate”.
  
• Pistorius’s psychologist and manager painted the picture of a broken man who is nonetheless humble and charitable, and who poses no danger to society.

Day 44: live coverage as it happened.

Day 45: 14 October 2014

• Defence witness Peet van Zyl, Pistorius’s manager, concluded his time on the stand after being grilled by state prosecutor Gerrie Nel about whether Pistorius’s charity work was really as selfless as van Zyl made out.
• The defence called its final witness, social worker Annette Vergeer, the second witness to recommend that Pistorius be sentenced to three years’ home arrest with community service rather than a jail term.
• Vergeer said she believed that Pistorius would be at risk in a South African prison, as he was “vulnerable” and they were ill-equipped to deal with disabled inmates.
• It emerged that Pistorius has been paying the family of Reeva Steenkamp around £338 per month since the month after the shooting, but they intend to pay back “every cent”.

Day 45: live coverage as it happened.

Day 46: 15 October 2014

• Kim Martin, a cousin of Reeva Steenkamp, took to the stand to be “Reeva’s voice”, after the victim’s parents, June and Barry Steenkamp, decided they could not give testimony.
  
• Martin told the court about her cousin, who she said was a hard worker, a fun-loving and nurturing person, who supported her parents financially. She said the loss of her cousin had ‘ruined our whole family’. After breaking her back in a horse-riding accident after studying for a law degree, Steenkamp had pursued a modelling career because ‘life can be over so quickly’.

• Lawyers for June and Barry Steenkamp clarified details of the payments made to them by Oscar Pistorius. They say the R6000 monthly payments will be repaid and the Steenkamps will not pursue a civil claim. Barry Roux told the court that his client did not want the money back.
• Nel sought to undermine the picture painted by defence witnesses of a violent, overcrowded prison system. There was not “the slightest possibility” that Pistorius’s prostheses would be confiscated, he told the court. The Department of Correctional Services issued a statement calling the defence claims “inaccurate”.

Day 46: live coverage as it happened.

Day 47: 16 October 2014

• Aimee Pistorius, sister of the athlete, was allegedly threatened in the court room by Mikey Schultz, a self-confessed killer.He denied swearing at her, calling the Pistorius family “a bunch of liars”.
  
• Zac Modise, acting national head of corrections services, agreed with the defence that it would not be suitable to house Pistorius in a general prison wing and he should be guaranteed a placement on a hospital wing.
• Threats have been made against Pistorius by gang leaders inside prison, the defence argued. Modise argued that South African jails are the best in Africa.
• Steenkamp’s cousin Kim Martin concluded her testimony on the effect of the killing on her family, saying Pistorius “needs to pay for what he’s done”.

Day 47: live coverage as it happened.

Day 48: 17 October 2014

The defence and the state concluded their arguments in mitigation and aggravation of sentence.

The defence argued:

• Pistorius should not be sent to prison because he is also a victim. His true sentence has been the loss of the woman he loved.
• Negative media coverage and lurid speculation on social media – which Judge Masipa said she would not take into account – as well as the prosecution’s treatment of Pistorius in court, had left him a broken man.
• The judge should apply the principle of ubuntu, humane punishment, in allowing Pistorius to “make good” by doing something for society. The money he paid to the parents of Reeva Steenkamp shows he wants to take responsibility. A community service can be appropriate.
• Sending Pistorius to prison, where he might not get proper medical care, could increase his risk of suicide and compromise the care he needs for his disabilities.
• Pistorius “absolutely” accepts the verdict of culpable homicide but his negligence in killing Reeva Steenkamp was born out of agenuine, if erroneous, belief that his life was at risk.

The state argued:

• Pistorius must go to prison for at least 10 years. Any sentence should acknowledge that the degree of negligence involved made the offence very close to murder. A community sentence would be “shockingly disproportionate”.
• Pistorius has “shamelessly” used his disability as an excuse and wants the court to think of him, not Steenkamp, as the victim in this case. The state does not believe he has shown remorse.
• The court has had months of hearing and thinking about Oscar Pistorius. It now needs to think about Reeva Steenkamp and her family.
• Pistorius’s offer of a financial settlement to Steenkamp’s parents was “an attempt to influence sentence”.
• It is not the business of the court to worry about conditions in prison: Pistorius can be catered for.

Day 48: live coverage as it happened.

Now everything rests in the hands of Judge Masipa, who returns to court on Tuesday morning to hand down sentence on Oscar Pistorius.

View image in fullscreen

Day 49: 21 October 2014

• Judge Thokozile Masipa tells Pistorius he must serve a five-year prison sentence for the culpable homicide of Reeva Steenkamp.
• She also handed down a three-year sentence for negligently discharging a firearm in a crowded restaurant, wholly suspended and to be served concurrently.
  
• There are disputed claims about how long the athlete will serve in prison, with the defence team indicating it expected him to be considered for house arrest after 10 months, and the National Prosecuting Authority insisting he must serve a minimum of one-third in jail: 20 months.
• Pistorius left court in a police van for prison, expected to be Kgosi Mampuru II prison, formerly Pretoria Central, where it is anticipated he will be housed in the hospital wing.
• In a statement read by Oscar Pistorius’s uncle, Arnold Pistorius, the family said it accepted the judgment: “Oscar will embrace this opportunity to pay back to society … As a family we are ready to support and guide Oscar as he serves his sentence.”

Day 49: live coverage as it happened.

View image in fullscreen