A South African police ballistics experts has reportedly testified in the ongoing murder trial of Oscar Pistorius that the Paralympian was not wearing his prosthetic legs when he shot his model girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp on Valentine's Day last year at his luxury Pretoria home.
Pistorius denies murdering Steenkamp, saying that he thought she was an intruder, although the prosecution said that he intentionally shot her after an argument
According to the BBC, on the trial's thirteenth day, Captain Christian Mangena said that analysis of the crime scene and his subsequent tests suggests that the Blade Runner was not wearing the prostheses when he fired the fatal shots.
The report mentioned that this lends support to the defence team's insistence that the shooting was not premeditated.
Mangena also said that the evidence pointed to the shots having been fired from a position greater than 23 inches away from the toilet door but no further than 3 metres, which matches Pistorius' testimony that he pulled the trigger while standing at the entrance to the bathroom.
Mangena further said that Steenkamp then fell backwards before being hit in the arm and the head by the last two bullets fired by Pistorius through the wooden door as she crossed both hands over her head to protect herself, adding that there had been a short break between the first and second shots and that the second bullet missed Steenkamp.
Mangena also said that after the third and fourth shots, Steenkamp 'ended up with her head on top of the toilet seat, and the lower part of her body on the rack', the report added.
