Oscar Pistorius sells his Pretoria home to pay murder trial costs

Oscar Pistorius has sold the Pretoria home where he shot dead his girlfriend, his estate agent said on Friday, as the legal fees from his lengthy murder trial mount.

"We have a buyer," Ansie Louw said. "We went through all the offers. We have accepted one of the bids and the transfer process is now under way."

Pistorius put the house, which is valued at more than £280,000, on the market earlier this year. His legal team includes three of South Africa's leading defence lawyers, a number of ballistics and forensic experts and a US crime scene reconstruction company. The total cost is estimated at £5,400 a day. His trial, initially set to last three weeks, is now in its third month.

In March, one of his lawyers, Brian Webber, said the athlete had been paying his own legal fees."It has become necessary to sell Mr Pistorius's home in the Silver Woods country estate in Pretoria in order for him to raise the necessary funds to cover his increasing legal costs," Webber said at the time.

Since the shooting Pistorius has been living at his uncle's house in Pretoria. He has also lost many of the endorsement deals that earned him about £300,000 a year.

At the time of his bail hearing, Pistorius also owned two other houses in Pretoria with a combined value of 1.5m rand (£85,000) and a vacant plot worth 1.6m rand in Cape Town.

Prosecutors have charged the double-amputee sprinter with intentionally killing 29-year-old Reeva Steenkamp.

Pistorius denies murdering the model on Valentine's Day last year, saying he shot her after mistaking her for an intruder.

The trial on Friday heard from defence ballistics expert Tom Wolmarans who testified that it was impossible to be certain how Steenkamp fell when she was hit by bullets, challenging the prosecution's implication that she might have been cowering in fear.

The trial continues.
Sent from my Blackberry® SmartPhone on MTN Zambia