Will OP become SA’s OJ?
By David Blood
When I first heard the news on the morning of Valentine’s Day that Oscar Pistorius had shot and killed his girlfriend Reeve Steenkamp through a locked toilet door and as the reported evidence began to unfold, I said to my wife: “This will be South Africa’s OJ trial”
The more things have unfolded so the similarities have begun to mount up and as someone who followed the OJ trial with keen interest the comparisons soon became ominous.
The two men were both high profile sportsmen accused of murdering their high profile and beautiful model partners and both pleaded not guilty to murder.
The first name that sprung to mind during Oscar’s bail hearing after the defence tore into the lead investigator Hilton Botha, was Mark Furhman, the cop who “found” the bloodstained glove – a key piece of evidence that he was accused of planting, after denying the prior use of racial slurs. He was later charged with perjury.
In Hilton Botha, the state produced a lead investigator, who traipsed all over the crime scene without protective footwear, failed to obtain cell phone and landline records, suggested that witnesses lived 600 meters away instead of 300 meters, failed to ascertain the contents of bottles he found, claiming that they contained Testosterone, when in fact they contained a herbal remedy – in short he was an unreliable witness who it was later reported by Eyewitness News Reporter Mandy Weiner, was facing seven counts of murder himself! Something the NPA were not aware of!
Egg on the face of the National Prosecuting Authority was thick and ugly!
The OJ lawyers became household names in the USA and around the world as careers were made or tarnished, names like Marcia Clarke, F. Lee Bailey, Robert Shapiro, Alan Deshowitz and Johnnie Cochran were on everyone’s lips and OJ spend around $5 million on his defence.
The OP lawyers include crack advocate Barry Roux who is up against the state’s top gun Gerrie Nel. Oscar can expect to pay a lot more in Rands than OJ, by the end of next year.
Oscar admits that he shot Reeva thinking that it was an intruder and as implausible as some of his testimony may sound; the prosecution could not find any evidence to disprove what he said in his lengthy affidavit.
The state’s case is based purely on circumstantial evidence and witness testimony from people who lived over 300 meters away who claimed to hear an argument – which could have come from anywhere within the estate – and up to six gunshots with screams in between, while only four bullet holes were found in the toilet door.
In OJ’s case there was unsubstantiated evidence from “eye witnesses” who saw OJ leaving the scene of the crime, but they never testified in court
The forensics in both cases was poorly handled by crime scene investigators – there certainly wasn’t any sense of a CSI team being there. Crucial evidence was overlooked at Oscar’s home and a bullet in the toilet – or casing, not sure about that – was not even spotted by the investigators who failed to determine whether or not the room was dark enough for Oscar not to have seen that Reeva was no longer in bed. Hello!
In OJ’s case the DNA evidence was thrown out because the chain of custody had not been properly followed and could have been contaminated.
Was there a history of violent behavior with Oscar, well he was arrested in 2009 accused of assaulting a woman at his home and he was involved in the discharge of a firearm at a restaurant in Melrose Arch.
In the OJ trial the opening argument put forward by the DA was that OJ had a history of abusing his wife Nicole.
Oscar was granted bail after the state failed to prove that he was a flight risk while OJ on the other hand fled bail which ended in a dramatic car chase through LA shown live on TV worldwide.
The OJ Simpson trial was a media circus with international interest, in today’s techno age of social networks and YouTube Oscar’s bail hearing was an even bigger media circus with networks from across the globe fighting to get into the courtroom, while the magistrate denied video access to the proceedings – how archaic!
OJ was found not guilty of murder – much to the surprise of everyone who had followed the case – and now spends his life in jail aged 64, serving 33years for armed robbery and kidnapping – completely unrelated crimes.
Will poor forensics get Oscar off the hook, guilty or not – I guess we will have to wait and see as the trial unfolds from June 4th this year.