adjourned the trial until 11 September when she will deliver her
verdict. She and her assessors have 4,000 pages of evidence to
consider.
The prosecution tried to characterise Mr Pistorius as a "hothead" who
intentionally killed Ms Steenkamp after an argument.
His defence team portrayed him as having a heightened response to
perceived danger due to his disability and background.
In court on Friday, Mr Roux said growing up with a disability
conditioned Mr Pistorius always to confront danger because he could
not flee.
He described it as a "slow burn" of insecurities and compared it to an
abused woman shooting her abuser.
Barry Roux tore into testimony given by some of Oscar Pistorius'
neighbours during his rebuttal of the prosecution's case. The Stipps
couple said they heard a woman's screams shortly before hearing
gunshots, which goes against Mr Pistorius' version that Reeva
Steenkamp did not scream at any point before she died. The defence
lawyer spent a lot time discrediting their evidence, describing it as
"unreliable".
He also made a compelling argument to show police tampering with the
crime scene. The minute-by-minute timeline presented by the defence
also seemed detrimental to the prosecution's assertion that there was
an argument before the shooting.
But the fact that Ms Steenkamp was killed is not disputed, so now the
judge must decide if it was murder or culpable homicide. Mr Roux urged
her to evaluate Mr Pistorius as a reasonable man and then consider his
actions in the light of his disability and anxiety disorder.
Mr Roux also dealt with phone data evidence on the night of the
shooting to show that the timeline of events fits the defence's
argument that Mr Pistorius fired the shots at the toilet door first on
his stumps.
Realising he had shot Ms Steenkamp by mistake, the defence says Mr
Pistorius put on his prosthetics and used a cricket bat to knock down
the door at 03.17 local time - five minutes after he says shots were
fired.
The prosecution alleges that the noises heard at 03.17 were the shots
being fired.
Mr Roux said analysis of the evidence showed there was anxious
high-pitched screaming followed by shouts of "help, help, help"
between the two sounds, which near neighbours say were made by a man,
not a woman as other witnesses testified.
Earlier, the defence said that there had been "no respect for the
crime scene", saying the state's case was discredited as Mr Pistorius'
house was tampered with inadvertently, with a fan and duvet being
moved.
Mr Pistorius and his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp had been dating for
three months before the fatal shooting
State prosecutor Gerrie Nel, in his closing statement on Thursday,
argued the athlete "cannot escape" a murder conviction, accusing him
of being a "deceitful witness" who told the court a "snowball of
lies".
Known as the "bull terrier", prosecutor Mr Nel said the athlete's
lawyers had presented two lines of defence that "can never be
reconciled".
Mr Pistorius said he had fired both involuntarily and also out of
fear, Mr Nel argued, insisting the court had to choose only one of his
defences.
Last month, a psychiatric report said Mr Pistorius had post-traumatic
stress disorder but no mental illness that could prevent him being
held criminally responsible for his actions.
If found guilty of murder, the 27-year-old, who went on trial on 3
March, 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 - if
convicted - receive about 15 years in prison.
For the first time since the trial began in March, the fathers of
Oscar Pistorius and Reeva Steenkamp appeared in court for the closing
arguments.
BBC
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