Oscar Pistorius neighbors grilled over screams
Pretoria, South Africa (CNN) - A defense attorney Tuesday tried to poke holes in the highly emotional testimony of the first witness in the murder trial of Olympian double-amputee Oscar Pistorius, as another witness said she also heard screams the night model Reeva Steenkamp was killed.
On the second day of the trial, testimony continued with the questioning of Pistorius' neighbor, Michelle Burger, who said Monday she was awakened by screams, followed by gunshots, when Pistorius shot and killed his girlfriend on Valentine's Day last year.
Defense attorney Barry Roux attacked Burger's credibility, accusing her of using her husband's statement to craft her own.
Paragraph by paragraph, Roux pointed out similarities between their two statements. Burger repeatedly explained that the statements were similar because they both heard the same thing. "I'm as honest as I can be to the court," she said.
Pistorius has admitted he killed Steenkamp but pleaded not guilty, saying that he mistakenly believed he was shooting a burglar. He only realized after firing four shots that his girlfriend was not in bed but in the bathroom he was firing at, his defense team said on his behalf Monday.
Burger cried when she described the gunfire. "It was awful to hear the shots," she said through tears.
On Monday, Burger testified that, "Something terrible was happening at that house." She called the shouts and screams "petrifying."
Roux questioned how Burger had heard the screams from far away: "You heard that out of a closed toilet in a house 177 meters away?
On Twitter
Condolences to the Steenkamps, but I wonder what's going on with the election over there. Didn't seem like The People had a lot of faith in Zuma's commitment to them, and it'd be a real shame to see the progress made by Sombukwe & Mandela start to come unraveled within months of his death.