Oscar Pistorius Trial to Resume On Monday


By Robert    28-Jun-2014 09:44 UTC+02:00

Photocred: www.sheknows.comMurder accused, Oscar Pistorius’ high-profile legal battle is set to resume in the North Gauteng High Court on Monday morning.

According to a statement released by news service Eyewitness News, a psychiatric report on Oscar Pistorius is complete and ready for collection at Weskoppies psychiatric hospital.

The Paralympian gold medalist athlete is on trial for shooting dead his girlfriend at the time, Reeva Steenkamp, at their luxury home on February 14 last year. The decorated athlete claims that the shooting was an accident and that he mistook her for an intruder in the early hours of the morning and shot her through a closed door. The trial has received global media attention and has been screened on a dedicated channel, whereby analysts and the public alike have been dissecting the courtroom tactics of the state and the accused. Both the accused’s lawyer, Barry Roux, and Gerrie Nel, who represents the state, have become household names, along with those of Reeva Steenkamp and Oscar Pistorius.

Pistorius has completed his court mandated 30 days of psychiatric evaluation and is due back in the courtroom for the resumption of the trial on Monday. The report was done by three psychiatrists and one criminal psychologist and was completed on Friday. The proceedings, however, were slightly delayed when one of the psychiatrists tasked with evaluating Pistorius suffered a heart attack. This created a slight delay as the man was needed to sign the documents and could not due to his physical state. The man who had the heart attack, Dr Leon Fourie, was the fourth signatory for the report and thus the state had to postpone the collection until he was in a state to do so. He has since recovered to the point whereby he could perform this task.

Oscar Pistorius was to be evaluated as the defence allegedly claimed that he suffers from general anxiety disorder, which caused him to be more likely to respond in the manner which he did. The state, however claims he simply did it in a fit of rage. Consequently he was ordered to undergo a 30 day evaluation procedure. It has been reported that Mr Pistorius attended every session requested of him at the Weskoppies Hospital. If he failed to do so, he would have faced the possiblity of arrest and further charges.

The trial resumes on Monday and defence advocate Barry Roux has stated that he will call just three more witnesses.


Leave a comment