Oscar Trial Day 28

When defence ballistics expert "Wollie" Wolmarans asked for a firearm during the 28^th day of Oscar Pistorius’s murder trial, prosecutor Gerrie Nel responded: "We've got a crack team, My Lady, but unfortunately we don't have any guns."

Wolmarans had asked for the gun to demonstrate safety measures as part of his testimony. When none was forthcoming, he relied on pictures instead.

The ballistics expert told the court that, in his opinion, there were factors such as deflection that could have altered the trajectory of the bullets that the athlete fired through his toilet door, killing his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp, in the early hours of Valentine's Day last year.

These factors were not taken into consideration by Captain Christiaan Mangena, the state's ballistics expert, during his investigation, he said..

Using a pantry door from Pistorius's house, which was similar to the toilet door in his home, Wolmarans conducted tests to determine the dispersement of splinters.

He concluded that Steenkamp must have been standing with her right upper arm somewhere between 6 and 20cm from the door when she was hit.

However, he added that he did not think it was possible to determine with any degree of certainty either the order of the shots or the position of Steenkamp's body when she was hit. Pistorius's advocate Barry Roux will continue leading Wolmarans through his testimony when court resumes tomorrow morning.

The ballistics expert is the eleventh witness called by the defence out of a possible total of 14 to 17 it intends to call before finishing the its case.