PRETORIA: The murder trial of Paralympian Oscar Pistorius resumed on Monday with experts saying they had found no sign of mental illness after four weeks of psychiatric tests.

“Mr Pistorius did not suffer from a mental illness or defect that would have rendered him criminally not responsible for the offense charged,” said state prosecutor Gerrie Nel.

He was reading from one of two reports prepared during a month of examination by a psychiatric panel and a psychologist. Both said Pistorius could be held criminally responsible.

The 27-year-old star runner is accused of murdering his model girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp on Valentine’s Day last year.

He admits shooting Steenkamp with a 9mm pistol through a locked toilet door, but says it was a mistake as he thought she was an intruder coming to attack him in the dead of night.

“Mr Pistorius was capable of appreciating the wrongfulness of his act,” said Nel.

Sitting in the dock, Pistorius stared straight ahead, unblinking, as Nel read the reports.

The month-long mental assessment was ordered by Judge Thokozile Masipa after a defense witness testified that the Paralympic gold medallist has “generalized anxiety disorder.” The defense team claimed the condition could have resulted in a heightened fear of crime that affected his judgment the night he shot his 29-year-old girlfriend.

Nel who has been described as a pit bull terrier for his ruthless cross-examination style in the trial, asked the court to closely interrogate the psychiatrist’s diagnosis, fearing Pistorius may exploit concerns about his mental health to reset the case.

Pistorius’s defense lawyer Barry Roux said his team agreed with the report, but asked for more time to review it.

The athlete has often broken down during the proceedings, sobbing and vomiting when graphic details about Steenkamp’s death were presented to the court.

His outbursts were so frequent that his defense team started keeping a bucket close by the dock.

After the four-week hiatus, the trial resumed on Monday with the defense calling some of its final witnesses.

They included Gerald Versfeld, an orthopaedic surgeon who amputated Pistorius’s lower legs when he was a toddler.

Versfeld testified Pistorius is wobbly on his stumps and experiences “severe pain” when standing on them.

The defense wants to show that Pistorius could not have bashed down the toilet door with the cricket bat while on his stumps, as the prosecution claims.

“On his stumps Oscar Pistorius has serious difficulty walking or standing without support,” said Versfeld, “his ability to warn off danger is severely impaired.” In a tense moment, a clearly uncomfortable Pistorius, wearing a dark charcoal suit, was asked to show Judge Masipa his stumps and where he was vulnerable.

In cross-examination the prosecution tried to show that Pistorius’s team had overstated his immobility and that he had in fact moved around on his stumps prior to Steenkamp’s death.

The prosecution argues the shooting of Steenkamp was cold-blooded murder following a row between the young couple and has gathered evidence of a tempestuous relationship.

The defense next called Ivan Lin, an acoustics expert, to testify if Pistorius neighbors could have differentiated between a man and woman screaming.

Earlier in the trial, state witnesses said they heard a woman’s “bloodcurdling screams” the night Pistorius shot Steenkamp, suggesting the model and law graduate was screaming before she was shot.

The defense said Pistorius sounds like a woman when he screams.

“Theoretically one can differentiate a male and a female scream but one cannot say reliably, without exception... it’s a male or female scream,” said Lin, appearing to support the defense assertion it was Pistorius screaming, not Steenkamp.