Pistorius Nearly Shot a Friend Once by Mistake

Unsurprisingly, a series of much more minor "Oscar + guns" stories are coming out of the woodwork. Today's entry: Not long before killing his girlfriend, Oscar Pistorius nearly shot a friend in an upscale restaurant by mistake, AFP reports. Pistorius was checking out a friend's revolver when it got caught on his pants "and a shot went off," said boxer Kevin Lerena, who said the bullet landed mere inches from his foot. When restaurant staff inquired about the loud bang, Pistorius and his friends played dumb. In related news:

• Pistorius has assembled a "crack team of lawyers" prior to his bail hearing tomorrow, Business Insider reports. But he will be facing Gerrie Nel, a hard-nosed prosecutor who is famous in South Africa for getting the country's former police chief sent to prison on bribery charges.
• The Washington Post reports that Pistorius' reps have deemed it wise to remove a Nike ad calling him "the bullet in the chamber" from the runner's website. Nike won't be running Pistorius ads anytime soon, reports Reuters, which looks at how Nike has pinned its reputation to the fate of other athletes gone wrong, like Lance Armstrong and Tiger Woods.
• With violence against women already rife in South Africa, the women's league of the ruling African National Congress party has said Pistorius does not deserve bail. Studies show that roughly one in four South African women has been raped, and an intimate partner murders his girlfriend there every eight hours, the Globe and Mail reports.

For more, read about the steroids and bloody bat found in Pistorius' home after he killed girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp. (More Oscar Pistorius stories.)