Trial Discussion Thread #10 - 14.03.19, Day 13

[Trooper]

Where is the source of your information regarding the slapped wrist punishment for discharging a gun in a public place? If that's so, and it's such a minor offence, what's the point of charging him now? You've tried to outline the seriousness of the charge, and why it's relative to Reeva's case, then go on to say he'd only get a slapped wrist. Bit of an own goal there.

Re: Verdict times. Nobody knows, not even the judge.

I presume you are referring to Darrin Fresco in the matter of a slapped wrist ?? Darrin didn't fire the gun. he got immunity for originally lying about it and taking the blame for it

Samantha didn't fire the gun.. she was in the car when it was fired..

the owners of Tasha didn't fire a gun ... they had the thing fired in their restaurant..

they get the slapped wrist for not reporting this discharge of firearms.

it was OSCAR who fired the gun illegally.. I thought that was well known, and didn't realize that you hadn't followed the testimony.

its the firing of the gun that is a matter of criminal charges.. which, obviously, is why Oscar is , indeed, charged under the criminal law of SA for doing so.

not reporting the firing is a misdemeanor. :cheers:

 

[steveml]

It's (sort of) pointless now, but like I said, if the judge rejects the state's version of premeditation, then Oscar's story will come into play as she will have, by default, accepted Oscar's version of events and rule accordingly (not guilty because he had a reasonable fear for his life, guilty of murder, or guilty of culpable homicide). So it makes sense to talk about it.

Yep, I think I can see your point. I think the aspect of debate in particular was the hiding of the intruder, which window, where he may have hid and other specifics. These will not be of issue because if OP's story is accepted, then only anything that happened until the bathroom door is shot becomes relevant. i.e. Reeva's body is discovered and then the rest of the story is as we've heard in the trial.

 

[steveml]

I presume you are referring to Darrin Fresco in the matter of a slapped wrist ?? Darrin didn't fire the gun. he got immunity for originally lying about it and taking the blame for it

Samantha didn't fire the gun.. she was in the car when it was fired..

the owners of Tasha didn't fire a gun ... they had the thing fired in their restaurant..

they get the slapped wrist for not reporting this discharge of firearms.

it was OSCAR who fired the gun illegally.. I thought that was well known, and didn't realize that you hadn't followed the testimony.

its the firing of the gun that is a matter of criminal charges.. which, obviously, is why Oscar is , indeed, charged under the criminal law of SA for doing so.

not reporting the firing is a misdemeanor. :cheers:

This has been a good sensible discussion so far. Let's agree to disagree and avoid the sarcasm.

 

[Trooper]

I don't think it can be claimed that the RSA and its Government , suddenly made up the law against firing the gun in a public place. ( a restaurant, the public highway) just to charge Oscar with it as an inconvenience attached to a murder charge.

That is a rather large stretch.. a bold stretch. hehe.. noo. that law, and its attached law has been in place for over 15 years.

 

[steveml]

Something just occurred to me about OP version of events .
RS bladder was virtually empty so we know she must have gone to the toilet some time just before she died which means she would likely have wiped herself with tissue and then flushed the toilet .If that is the case the noise of a flushing toilet would have been very obvious . If she hadn't flushed it then there should be forensic evidence of that ?
If the toilet bowl was clean except for blood then surely he can't expect us to believe that he still thought it was an intruder in there using and flushing a toilet ?

I could be wrong but I'm not sure they could find much useful information regarding times Reeva may have used the toilet. It could be worth a look back.

 

[MeeBee]

Yep, I think I can see your point. I think the aspect of debate in particular was the hiding of the intruder, which window, where he may have hid and other specifics. These will not be of issue because if OP's story is accepted, then only anything that happened until the bathroom door is shot becomes relevant. i.e. Reeva's body is discovered and then the rest of the story is as we've heard in the trial.

Oh, yeah, I agree with that. Much of what is being discussed in that regard is completely irrelevant and silly. There was no intruder and was (perhaps) a manifestation of Oscar's crazy mind. The placement or rationale of an imaginary burglar is moot.

 

[steveml]

I don't think it can be claimed that the RSA and its Government , suddenly made up the law against firing the gun in a public place. ( a restaurant, the public highway) just to charge Oscar with it as an inconvenience attached to a murder charge.

That is a rather large stretch.. a bold stretch. hehe.. noo. that law, and its attached law has been in place for over 15 years.

Where was that implied? The firearm charges were brought by the state prior to the trial. Until Reeva's murder there was no pending charge against OP.

 

[MeeBee]

I don't think it can be claimed that the RSA and its Government , suddenly made up the law against firing the gun in a public place. ( a restaurant, the public highway) just to charge Oscar with it as an inconvenience attached to a murder charge.

That is a rather large stretch.. a bold stretch. hehe.. noo. that law, and its attached law has been in place for over 15 years.

:nevermind:

I made a pact with myself no more WS time outs...so...

:innocent: :silenced:

 

[Trooper]

This has been a good sensible discussion so far. Let's agree to disagree and avoid the sarcasm.

:chillout:

 

[Viper]

BBM...

that's a bold claim!!.. the charges were bought against him because they relate to Oscars charge of premeditated murder. For the simple fact that in these instances , he fired a gun without warning in the presence of other people and possibly at other people ... Just like he murdered Reeva..

not only did he fire a gun at those events, he didn't need any provocation in one instance ( the restaurant ) and in the other, he was needled by the police delaying his journey .

the owners of Tashas should have reported it. they would have got a slapped wrist. Darrin should have reported it He would have got a slapped wrist. ( he got immunity for lying about it and taking the blame for it ) . Samantha would have got a slapped wrist for not reporting it.

If it was only character , the police could have bought in all the people who he terrified by driving over the speed limit with a passenger, the girl he slammed the door into at a party, the oh you get my drift, though..

it wasn't about his character.. the defence will bring in the stuff about his character.. the prosecution has no stake in that, but they do have a stake in what previous circumstances Oscar has fired a gun around or at people.

Your last paragraph is spot on! People are excluding his other crimes as being real crimes that on their own could get him a slap on the wrist or they could land him in prison for 5-15 years! Instead many are only focusing on how those crimes relate to his character flaws (committing bad acts, having others take the blame for his bad acts, etc...). It is semantics really, but many can argue about any infintesimal thing!

 

[Mrs G Norris]

Something just occurred to me about OP version of events .
RS bladder was virtually empty so we know she must have gone to the toilet some time just before she died which means she would likely have wiped herself with tissue and then flushed the toilet .If that is the case the noise of a flushing toilet would have been very obvious . If she hadn't flushed it then there should be forensic evidence of that ?
If the toilet bowl was clean except for blood then surely he can't expect us to believe that he still thought it was an intruder in there using and flushing a toilet ?

That is a good point. Had Reeva just used the toilet, were her pants on etc? I can't really get past the idea of her locking the door myself, seems like an unusual thing to do in your boyfriends apartment at night. Also Oscar has some great fear of crime yet sleeps with the balcony doors open. Frankly it doesn't add up for me, but the case is not as strong as I hoped either. I feel like there is evidence that may have been missed in the home.

 

[steveml]

Well I thought of that too, but then one would think forensics people would have commented on the testing they did of these 2 bloodied regions.

As it stands now, the judge could say Pros. showed those bloodied regions, but did nothing further so she has to discount them, which again makes it look absurd to have beeh shown in the first place.

So once again, we just ahve to wait till state's final summary.

It's only just crossed my mind, but from what I can remember the last bloodstain pattern witness said he was brought in specifically to see if there was any evidence of blunt trauma injury.

Could it be that he was a particular expert in this field, and there may still be another bloodstain pattern witness to appear for the prosecution? This could perhaps be a possibility as to why the blood found in the bedroom has not yet been discussed.

 

[Viper]

He has done it before on several occasions, so why wouldn't he do it again?

The point is OP really was not feeling vulnerable, was he? That was a lie. His actions contradict his claims.

 

[Trooper]

Where was that implied? The firearm charges were brought by the state prior to the trial. Until Reeva's murder there was no pending charge against OP.

well no.. there was no pending charge. But once you have plugged 4 black talon bullets into a woman you know when she is locked in a toilet in your own home, and tell police you thought she was an inruder, the police ALL OVER THE WORLD will look at you a bit more closely and ask around with the view of finding out if this is part of your modus operandi.. have you waved guns about before?? fired a few off in circumstances shady and illegally?? and all over the world, if , in fact you have done that, as Oscar had, people will say so.

it isn't a unique and isolated and unusual process. not in my country ,not in yours and not in Oscars.. its how it is.

As it happens, Samantha's mother was the one who 'dobbed'.. Samantha had told her about it, ( the Vaal river drive) . that led to Darrin, the driver of the car, and that led to the restaurant.

Possibly, that's why Samanthas mother is on the witness list.

its not a complicated path, really.

 

[MeeBee]

The point is OP really was not feeling vulnerable, was he? That was a lie. His actions contradict his claims.

How do you figure?

 

[Gbtaketwo]

That is a good point. Had Reeva just used the toilet, were her pants on etc? I can't really get past the idea of her locking the door myself, seems like an unusual thing to do in your boyfriends apartment at night. Also Oscar has some great fear of crime yet sleeps with the balcony doors open. Frankly it doesn't add up for me, but the case is not as strong as I hoped either. I feel like there is evidence that may have been missed in the home.

Yes her pants were pulled up and she was facing the door when shot .So assuming that she had just been to the toilet ( which is OP defence ) and pulled her pants up why would she just stand there in a locked toilet in the middle of the night and not unlocked the door to go and wash her hands and head straight back to bed ?
If OP had shot her accidentally whilst she was walking the couple of feet to unlock the door to come out he would have clearly heard the cistern refilling .It takes just about 80 seconds for an average cistern to refill after flush and can be heard outside a closed cubicle ( I have one like this with brick walls and yet we can still hear it in the bedroom ) This is why I am struggling to believe his version of events .There are so many things that don't add up or seem plausible .
Another thing that I can't understand is the jeans outside the bathroom window .
I have my own theory for this and am surprised more has not been made of it .

 

[Interested Bystander]

How do you figure?

If someone chases down trouble it doesn't follow IMO that he feels vulnerable. He has always said of himself that his lack of legs is irrelevant. Whether that is bravado or not one can only guess.

 

[Viper]

Well it's a bit quiet in here so I thought I would see if I can answer my own questions.

According to this website that seems to know what it's talking about, even if you accept that OP didn't know who he was shooting, he was still guilty of murder.



BBM.

So, all this arguing about bat shots and screams seems beside the point. If you go about firing 4 hollow tip bullets at someone without having ascertained whether the pose any threat, you are a murderer. You are a murderer whether they turn out to be your girlfriend or not. The prosecution does not need to prove this was done in anger in order to get a murder conviction. Though I imagine it will influence the sentence greatly if they do.

Thank you for that! I can't understand those that believe that the SA laws could in any way define what OP did as culpable homicide, what he did was murder. :facepalm:

And for that matter what is the point in even trying to minimize it? Even if you do try to minimize it the end result is still the same, the man is going to prison for a very long time!!!

 

[LemonMousse]

I'd like to add a few more points about the door and possible bat sounds. I know there is a separate thread for this but I am specifically responding to various points made last night in this one.

The two extremely unscientific tests comparing bat sounds and gunshots are a bit useless really for many reasons but they both give us a few clues.

The two differ in one very important way - only the test carried out on the firing range measured the decibel levels. This is the ONLY way to get a reasonable estimation of how loud something is. You can't do that with a microphone for many technical reasons. The YouTube video was merely to show that a gun shot can sound like a bat on a door. I don't doubt that - lots of sounds can sound like gunshots.

The issue here is whether it's reasonable to believe that the bat sounds could sound exactly the same to Dr Stipp's ears - and that includes their volume - and whether they are generally likely to be heard at all at that distance away.

The firing range test is useful because they recorded their decibel levels. As the audiologist said, a cricket back would usually be around 80 decibels but in this case the man hitting the door whacked it as hard as he could and managed to reach 114db. That's pretty good going and really very loud indeed. This is around the kind of db level you'd be subject to sitting in the first row of a rock concert.

A gun shot is usually between 130 - 140 db. If we take the lowest level then we have 114db vs 130 db. That difference doesn't sound like much but, in fact, it's an enormous difference. A good and simple rule of thumb is that for every 10db increase you double the "loudness". So 124db is double 114, and 134 is double 124db (this is because a decibel is a logarithmic unit of measurement). So, 130db is much, much, much louder than 114.

On this basis I find it difficult to believe that Stipp wouldn't at least mention that one set of bangs was considerably fainter. He didn't - he was adamant that they sounded the same.

And then there's the physical evidence of the door itself. The YT video is useful because it gives us a brief glimpse of what happens to a panelled door when you hit it with a cricket bat.

Bear in mind that this door is held up by a solid piece of wood behind it, so isn't even slightly analogous to the real door. And the four times we actually see the guy hit the door he manages to hit the frame not the panel three times.

But he hits the panel once. And what do we see? A dent. Where are the dents on the door that OP hit? There are none. There are a few gashes where the veneer has come away, but no actual dents. Does anyone seriously believe he whacked that door with all his might and left not a single dent?

If it was a very heavy, solid oak door or something then OK. But it's not - it's a door with very thin panels glued together, providing fault lines that they split along.

That is not a door that's been bashed in with a cricket bat. It's been hit with it, clearly, but not particularly ferociously. It broke because the panels were prised out, either with the bat or with hands.

I am not saying I am right and the others are wrong. But I have been asked to explain why I don't believe the bangs Stipp heard were bat sounds, and I have done. I think my objections are reasonable - but there are many variables, not least of which is the quality of Stipp's hearing!

 

[MeeBee]

I'd be curious to see if Roux took some experts to Oscar's house and did some tests. That should put the matter to rest.