Oscar Pistorius Murder Trial Resumes After Six-Week Break

The murder trial of Oscar Pistorius is resuming in South Africa after a six-week break to evaluate the athlete’s mental health.

His defence team has argued he was suffering from an anxiety disorder when he killed his girlfriend.

A report by experts will help the judge decide how significant this is.

The athlete denies deliberately killing Reeva Steenkamp. He says he shot her accidentally in a state of panic after mistaking her for an intruder.

BBC Africa reports that the experts’ report seems unlikely to alter the course of this trial dramatically – the defence has already acknowledged that Mr Pistorius’s anxiety would not have stopped him knowing right from wrong.

The defence is expected to finish presenting its evidence in the next few days – calling perhaps three more witnesses.

If found guilty of murder, Mr Pistorius, who went on trial on 3 March this year, could face life imprisonment. If he is acquitted of that charge, the court will consider an alternative charge of culpable homicide, for which he could receive about 15 years in prison.

Steenkamp, a 29-year-old model and law graduate, was shot through a toilet door at Oscar Pistorius’s house in Pretoria on Valentine’s Day last year.

The couple had been dating for three months.