Discussion between the verdict and sentencing

[AW2B]

What a great find MS. Frank's room is quite a way from OP's bedroom so he might genuinely not heard the commotion.

Was it ever mentioned how/when he woke up. IIRC..the first person to arrive at his house was greeted by Chiziweni..

 

[PrimeSuspect]

Was it ever mentioned how/when he woke up. IIRC..the first person to arrive at his house was greeted by Chiziweni..

No it wasn't mentioned. The police said FC heard and saw nothing. Frank's movements that night should have been recorded. jmo

 

[sleuth-d-]

Yes, could have had absolutely nothing to do with that night.

But it seems a touch odd that (apart from the window downstairs) the only damage in the house was to that one same door.

And Pistorius did not live in a total dump. Things weren't working as they should, true, but he doesn't seem like the kind of person who would walk around his house shooting through doors with an air gun.

And Nel put that picture up for a reason.....because it didn't look good. OK, Masipa took no notice, but Roux couldn't have known she wouldn't and I think he'd have wanted to explain it if it was totally innocent.

I am 50/50 on it. Could be totally irrelevant.

We all know who would know though, right? Mr Frank! Hope he writes a book and then runs off some where with the money that has no extradition treaty. Hell, he can come and stay with me. I'll hide him from the Addams, I mean, Pistorius family.

i would pay to read frank's version of events. don't think it would be 200 pages of him dreaming of sheep.

 

[Interested Bystander]

Does anyone have any theories on the bullet hole in the bedroom door?

That night? A previous occasion? Could this have been the first bangs the Stipp's heard?

An air rifle makes very little noise at all and Stipps would not have heard one being fired.

It would be interesting to know whether any of his past girlfriends were aware of the damage to the bedroom door, especially ST. If the door was damaged when last she saw him it would at least confirm that this did not happen on the night of the murder.

This link will show how much noise an air rifle uses with and without a silencer. Apologies for the rather stupid video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P-DBgZ7STzA

@ roughly 56 seconds

 

[sleuth-d-]

Mrs Stipp thought the screams were coming closer. I have always thought he chased RS from the bedroom, with bat in hand and threatening her. She ran to the bathroom, which she must have thought was her only safe haven, and locked herself in the toilet cubicle. He then proceeded to batter the bath panel (dislodging the metal plate) and door so hard that it dislodged the tiles to the LH side of the toilet door. IMO RS would be screaming throughout this. I know I would have been.

thinking about this, how does one know the screams are getting closer? could they have just been getting louder... either with more terror, or because reeva had opened the toilet window? or both.

 

[jay-jay]

I was just outside letting my dogs out into the backyard. I heard a man’s voice, extremely loud, very angry; he was clearly in a serious argument with someone. He was somewhere on the next street over (if not farther?) - don’t know how far up or down that street. There are houses, walls and trees in between. Despite this, I clearly made out 80% of his words perfectly. He wasn’t even close to screaming for his life. (Back inside my house, where the A/C is running and the back door closed, I cannot hear him at all.)

State’s ear witnesses (as well as the Standers) had their bedroom doors OPEN - that’s why they heard as much as they did from OP’s OPEN windows and doors!

Anyone who says that it’s not possible to hear an argument at 98m or a woman’s blood-curdling, terrified screams for her life at 177m is full of 24K s#!t.

.. and the fact that Michelle Burger did actually hear a 'help, help, help' and couldn't possibly have known that other witnesses had heard this too, confirms that she did actually hear that, so would also have heard shots and screams* (which she did actually use other words as well as 'bloodcurdling' to describe it ... 'petrifying' being the main one, but also 'intensifying'/building in anxiety and fear .. so just because the 'bloodcurdling' word became a buzzword does not mean that it was any less meaningful, because she did actually explain it several times using other words to describe it).

* by the way, I'm just listening to Burger's testimony and cross examination again, and Roux seems to be playing a very dirty little game with regard to her 'not mentioning the bloodcurdling screams' in her original statement .. he says all she said was she heard 'screams' .. but, from what I can make out (I'm right at that very bit at the moment) he is just referring to one paragraph where she said that, but then moves onto another paragraph where she does actually state about the raising anxiety in the screams she heard .. she did not actually need to use the word 'bloodcurdling', plus also she may well have said more about it elsewhere in her statement (if only we could see it!). Roux seems to be very good at doing this, just like how he mixed up the scene of crime photos and put some of those that were taken later in with some of the initial ones, to make it look as if the crime scene had been tampered with, when actually it hadn't and they were just photos of things like the phone that had been covered with the towel/bath mat that obviously needed to be removed in order to photograph it!

 

[sleuth-d-]

BBM

To me ..it's evidence that something of a violent nature was going on BEFORE the murder. This evidence is indeed corroborated by the witness who heard a loud argument. For example. they had a fight.. Reeva was getting ready to leave the house..she got her jeans ..he grabbed them and threw them out the bathroom window..

I cannot find an innocent explanation for the location of Reeva's jeans being under the bathroom window..

agreed.
clothes being thrown out of the window together with the shout of 'get the ****** out of my house' - sounds a bit like a domestic argument doesn't it

 

[PrimeSuspect]

http://www.theguardian.com/world/vi...al-witness-heard-blood-curdling-screams-audio

Michelle Berger says just after 3, she woke up from a woman's terrible screams. Just revisiting her testimony, tape is 4 m and 52 sec long.

 

[Interested Bystander]

thinking about this, how does one know the screams are getting closer? could they have just been getting louder... either with more terror, or because reeva had opened the toilet window? or both.

My guess would be that the window had always been open. It was a hot night and the air conditioning was not working, hence the fans. Perhaps the open window would help create a draught. I agree they could have just been getting louder but the way Mrs Stipps described that she wondered whether someone was coming down the street does suggest a sound moving closer but we will never know.

 

[AW2B]

No it wasn't mentioned. The police said FC heard and saw nothing. Frank's movements that night should have been recorded. jmo

I must admit I have a hard time believing Chiziweni didn't hear anything...given that neighbors that lived quite a distance were woken up by the screams..the shots...etc..etc..

 

[PrimeSuspect]

.. and the fact that Michelle Burger did actually hear a 'help, help, help' and couldn't possibly have known that other witnesses had heard this too, confirms that she did actually hear that, so would also have heard shots and screams* (which she did actually use other words as well as 'bloodcurdling' to describe it ... 'petrifying' being the main one, but also 'intensifying'/building in anxiety and fear .. so just because the 'bloodcurdling' word became a buzzword does not mean that it was any less meaningful, because she did actually explain it several times using other words to describe it).

* by the way, I'm just listening to Burger's testimony and cross examination again, and Roux seems to be playing a very dirty little game with regard to her 'not mentioning the bloodcurdling screams' in her original statement .. he says all she said was she heard 'screams' .. but, from what I can make out (I'm right at that very bit at the moment) he is just referring to one paragraph where she said that, but then moves onto another paragraph where she does actually state about the raising anxiety in the screams she heard .. she did not actually need to use the word 'bloodcurdling', plus also she may well have said more about it elsewhere in her statement (if only we could see it!). Roux seems to be very good at doing this, just like how he mixed up the scene of crime photos and put some of those that were taken later in with some of the initial ones, to make it look as if the crime scene had been tampered with, when actually it hadn't and they were just photos of things like the phone that had been covered with the towel/bath mat that obviously needed to be removed in order to photograph it!

I find it annoying too, but two can play at that game, lol, OP said Reeva was asleep or at least didn't speak in his initial statement, later he says Reeva asked, 'Can't you sleep, baba?'.

OP also said he whispered to Reeva to call the police, then during cross he said he spoke in a low voice to Reeva, to call the police.

But anywho, JM believed OP. :aktion1:

 

[delilah]

Once judge Masipa and/or her associated assessors accepted OP's version as reasonably possibly true...

snipped

steveml has thrown down the gauntlet so here is my attempt to show how OP's version is reasonably possibly true. It's written in the first person and with no punctuation for effect, not because I don't know how to use a full stop:

I wake up Reeva says ‘Can’t sleep, Baba?’ I don’t look at her but I see the shape of her legs under the duvet I get out of bed rubbing my face with my hands and go over to the balcony doors it’s a really hot night but I want to close the doors and curtains because I’m terrified of intruders even though I was happy to go to sleep with the doors open because Reeva would have fought off an intruder by herself I bring in the two fans that are on the balcony except they are not on the balcony moving the large one by grabbing it from the front which is really awkward so I can keep my back to the bed I close the doors and draw the curtains so the bedroom is pitch black I shuffle around the bed but not looking at it making sure I don’t trip over the fans, ipad, hair clippers, reeva’s jeans, the extension cord, the fans’ cables plugged into the extension cord (except one of them isn’t because there is no space for it) and the duvet that was on the bed except it was on the floor all the while being so unstable on my stumps that I can’t balance but I can run and walk backwards on them if forced to re-enact how I killed my girlfriend

I get to the hi fi and even though the room is pitch black there’s a little blue LED light that’s really going to annoy me when I get back into bed even though it doesn’t shed enough light for me to see anything in the bedroom I could switch it off at the mains socket but I reckon it would be far better to cover it with the jeans that the ultra neat and tidy Reeva has dumped on the floor inside out then OMG I hear the bathroom window slam open!

Immediately concluding there’s an intruder in the bathroom not that it could be Reeva who I am sharing a bed with and who might have got up to go to the toilet when I was bringing in the fans that weren’t outside and not looking at the bed where I fully expect Reeva to be even though she’s actually in the bathroom I move to the left hand side of the bed and get my 9mm out from underneath it without stopping to tell Reeva what I am doing or pressing the panic button that I have in case intruders try to get into my house or activating the alarm that I may or may not have set before I went to sleep to attract attention I whisper to her in a soft voice to call the police but don't check she's heard me then make my way down the corridor on the stumps I can’t balance on shouting at the intruder to get the F out of my house get the F out of my house Reeva call the police while keeping quiet so as not to give away my position and not wondering why Reeva hasn’t replied then BANG! The toilet door slams shut!

I get to the entrance to the bathroom and see the window open but I’m sure there aren’t any other intruders on the ladder that isn’t propped up against the outside wall then SCREECH! I hear a sound that makes me think someone is coming out of the toilet but will later believe sounded like the magazine rack moving I decide not to fire into the shower cubicle in case the round ricochets and hits me so I fire four shots into the toilet door without thinking or meaning to fire the shots but intending to fire the shots although I never foresaw that firing four shots at someone behind a wooden door might conceivably result in death

I then move back along the corridor without bothering to check whether there are any other intruders on the ladder that isn’t propped up against the wall still with my 9mm in my hand I get to the bed and I’m surprised that Reeva isn’t still in it so I roll over the bed to check if she’s behind the curtains but she’s not it’s a second opportunity to activate my panic button or set off my alarm but I don’t do that or check if Reeva has actually gone out of the bedroom without activating the alarm that I can’t remember if I set or not I run back to the bathroom on the stumps I can hardly balance on screaming the toilet door is locked so I shoulder charge it even though it opens outwards I run back to the bedroom to go onto the balcony taking care not to trip over the fans, cables, clippers, jeans, duvet and ipad even though it’s still pitch black and the fans are blocking my way I shout HELP HELP HELP then go back into the bedroom past the panic button and decide to put my prosthetics on taking time to put my socks on first because I don’t want my stumps to get sore I grab my cricket bat and go back to the bathroom still wailing as if my life is in danger even though I know it's not I put down my 9mm and hit the door BASH...BASH BASH BASH coincidentally in the exact same pattern as the shots I fired earlier and by bending over so that I hit it at a height that is consistent with my being on my stumps except I’m wearing my prosthesis I stop screaming as soon as I hit the door for the last time and rip the door panels off then I see Reeva slumped over the toilet I reach in to pick up the key to unlock the door then I check Reeva she is breathing although she’s dead on account of having a shattered hip an amputated arm and a hole in her head

Reasonably possibly true? Indeed.

 

[sleuth-d-]

I respectfully disagree..

1- It's a rare and uncommon event to find jeans under bathroom windows!

+

2-This rare uncommon event happened on the same day the owner of those jeans was murdered!

+

3-She was murdered in the toilet area ..her shooter was standing in the BATHROOM..her jeans were found under the window of said bathroom..

=

The location of Reeva's jeans is connected to her murder which would contradict Pistorius's story..

+ all her other clothes were neatly packed.
+ apart from one other item. also jeans.

 

[Interested Bystander]

I must admit I have a hard time believing Chiziweni didn't hear anything...given that neighbors that lived quite a distance were woken up by the screams..the shots...etc..etc..

The police at the scene said they didn't believe him. He knows something. First on the scene but doesn't want to get involved so says he was asleep. What awoke him one wonders, especially as he was also dressed?? Misplaced loyalty IMO.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wor...s-at-Pistorius-home-on-night-of-shooting.html

He said police had been unconvinced by his response: “We were all asking ourselves how he could not have heard anything,” he said

 

[jay-jay]

http://www.theguardian.com/world/vi...al-witness-heard-blood-curdling-screams-audio

Michelle Berger says just after 3, she woke up from a woman's terrible screams. Just revisiting her testimony, tape is 4 m and 52 sec long.

She quite clearly differentiates between when she heard the woman's screams and hearing another voice, a man's voice, too. She knew the two voices came from two different people, she was quite clear about that .. and she was quite clear about the escalating fear in the woman's voice/screams. Why would Pistorius be screaming like that, why would his screams be 'petrified' screams .. he has no reason to be screaming petrified screams.

 

[AJ_DS]

About Reeva's jeans…

Let us say Nel had asked OP how the jeans ended up outside the house under the bathroom window.

Does everyone agree that OP had indeed prepared for such a question ?… I myself do.

What would have been OP's answer ?

Most certainly : "I do not know"

If pressed further by Nel or reexamined by Roux to speculate on said jeans

"Reeva had told me she had went back to the house to do some laundry"… common cause evidence, in Whatsapp messages

"I know she always air-dries her jeans because they shrink to much in the dryer"… makes sense, all my girlfriends do that

"It was a beautiful sunny hot day"… common cause evidence

"Perhaps she hung her jeans on the balcony railing"… the rest of Reeva's clothing was in her bag in the bedroom on the sofa

"She forgot about them and they fell with a gust of wind"… not uncommon occurrence when clothing goes from wet and heavy to dry and light

"My dogs love playing with new and novel things they find"… true of about every dog

"My dogs probably played with jeans which ended up under the bathroom window"… a dog is seen next to the jeans when photograph is taken

… now what is Nel to do with this answer ? how does it further the State's case ?

What is Masipa to do with that information ?

… the answer is nothing… it does not prove nor disprove OP's version of events… it does not contradict any other evidence or testimony.

The jeans are legally useless and totally non-probative with respect to the case… as for personal curiosity and speculation on how they could fit in an alternate premeditated murder version of events, I agree the jeans are fascinating.

 

[sleuth-d-]

My guess would be that the window had always been open. It was a hot night and the air conditioning was not working, hence the fans. Perhaps the open window would help create a draught. I agree they could have just been getting louder but the way Mrs Stipps described that she wondered whether someone was coming down the street does suggest a sound moving closer but we will never know.

i was wondering whether she opened the toilet window, as a possible reason why the screams became louder.

also this from jay-jay [ty] regarding ms burger's description of the screams:
"...which she did actually use other words as well as 'bloodcurdling' to describe it ... 'petrifying' being the main one, but also 'intensifying'/building in anxiety and fear"

my bold

 

[jay-jay]

Haahaa :lol: .. brilliant, delilah :great: (there's a wee bit in there about the position he was in when he whispered to Reeva, which was as he was getting his gun, I think, and not when he was going down the corridor .. but apart from that, it just about sums it up, really!)

 

[PrimeSuspect]

@ AJ, I wonder if it was windy that night for the jeans to have fallen from the railing, if they were hanging out there. If they were dragged by the dogs to under the toilet window, there would probably be evidence of teeth marks and/or saliva. lol
But as you say, they're probably not important but then again, they could be, it's a little bit of a lot of what OP knows and we will never know. :gaah:

 

[AJ_DS]

snipped

steveml has thrown down the gauntlet so here is my attempt to show how OP's version is reasonably possibly true. It's written in the first person and with no punctuation for effect, not because I don't know how to use a full stop:

I wake up Reeva says ‘Can’t sleep, Baba?’ I don’t look at her but I see the shape of her legs under the duvet I get out of bed rubbing my face with my hands and go over to the balcony doors it’s a really hot night but I want to close the doors and curtains because I’m terrified of intruders even though I was happy to go to sleep with the doors open because Reeva would have fought off an intruder by herself I bring in the two fans that are on the balcony except they are not on the balcony moving the large one by grabbing it from the front which is really awkward so I can keep my back to the bed I close the doors and draw the curtains so the bedroom is pitch black I shuffle around the bed but not looking at it making sure I don’t trip over the fans, ipad, hair clippers, reeva’s jeans, the extension cord, the fans’ cables plugged into the extension cord (except one of them isn’t because there is no space for it) and the duvet that was on the bed except it was on the floor all the while being so unstable on my stumps that I can’t balance but I can run and walk backwards on them if forced to re-enact how I killed my girlfriend

I get to the hi fi and even though the room is pitch black there’s a little blue LED light that’s really going to annoy me when I get back into bed even though it doesn’t shed enough light for me to see anything in the bedroom I could switch it off at the mains socket but I reckon it would be far better to cover it with the jeans that the ultra neat and tidy Reeva has dumped on the floor inside out then OMG I hear the bathroom window slam open!

Immediately concluding there’s an intruder in the bathroom not that it could be Reeva who I am sharing a bed with and who might have got up to go to the toilet when I was bringing in the fans that weren’t outside and not looking at the bed where I fully expect Reeva to be even though she’s actually in the bathroom I move to the left hand side of the bed and get my 9mm out from underneath it without stopping to tell Reeva what I am doing or pressing the panic button that I have in case intruders try to get into my house or activating the alarm that I may or may not have set before I went to sleep to attract attention I then make my way down the corridor whispering to Reeva in a soft voice to call the police (having forgotten to say that to her when I was two feet away from her in bed except she wasn’t] on the stumps I can’t balance on shouting at the intruder to get the F out of my house get the F out of my house Reeva call the police while keeping quiet so as not to give away my position and not wondering why Reeva hasn’t replied then BANG! The toilet door slams shut!

I get to the entrance to the bathroom and see the window open but I’m sure there aren’t any other intruders on the ladder that isn’t propped up against the outside wall then SCREECH! I hear a sound that makes me think someone is coming out of the toilet but will later believe sounded like the magazine rack moving I decide not to fire into the shower cubicle in case the round ricochets and hits me so I fire four shots into the toilet door without thinking or meaning to fire the shots but intending to fire the shots although I never foresaw that firing four shots at someone behind a wooden door might conceivably result in death

I then move back along the corridor without bothering to check whether there are any other intruders on the ladder that isn’t propped up against the wall still with my 9mm in my hand I get to the bed and I’m surprised that Reeva isn’t still in it so I roll over the bed to check if she’s behind the curtains but she’s not it’s a second opportunity to activate my panic button or set off my alarm but I don’t do that or check if Reeva has actually gone out of the bedroom without activating the alarm that I can’t remember if I set or not I run back to the bathroom on the stumps I can hardly balance on screaming the toilet door is locked so I shoulder charge it even though it opens outwards I run back to the bedroom to go onto the balcony taking care not to trip over the fans, cables, clippers, jeans, duvet and ipad even though it’s still pitch black and the fans are blocking my way I shout HELP HELP HELP then go back into the bedroom past the panic button and decide to put my prosthetics on taking time to put my socks on first because I don’t want my stumps to get sore I grab my cricket bat and go back to the bathroom still wailing as if my life is in danger even though I know it's not I put down my 9mm and hit the door BASH...BASH BASH BASH coincidentally in the exact same pattern as the shots I fired earlier and by bending over so that I hit it at a height that is consistent with my being on my stumps except I’m wearing my prosthesis I stop screaming as soon as I hit the door for the last time and rip the door panels off then I see Reeva slumped over the toilet I reach in to pick up the key to unlock the door then I check Reeva she is breathing although she’s dead on account of having a shattered hip an amputated arm and a hole in her head

Reasonably possibly true? Indeed.

In what universe is that reasonably possibly true…??… It sound so made up and nonsensical to me.

Plus that tale only takes into account OP's version of events… no other testimony, evidence, expert evidence… and none of the flagrant contradictions during OP's cross-examination and none of the changes and omissions in OP's previous statements such as in the bail affidavit and the plea explanation.