He needs to go back to school. Unrelenting sarcasm and mockery is not a successful cross-examination technique. He comes off as a bully. His questions are designed to express his thoughts and then present them to the witness. Witness examination is not the time to express your thoughts, you do that in closing. I've seen the judge take him to task for his overly confrontational style before in this trial.
I'm hoping for an alternative sentence. My best guess is he will get it, with a lot of community work, or he'll get a token (shock)sentence -- 1 or 2 years so he never forgets the experience and it will serve as a hefty deterrent to committing negligent/reckless acts in the future.
The most effective trial lawyers modulate their tone and go from soft and easy, polite, curious, to sharp, not in any particular order. It keeps the witness wondering what is coming next, leaving less time to focus on memorized answers to expected questions
One of my first trials many decades ago was for a biker in a nationally prominent club who I had gotten off a drug charge. He and his wife got divorced. She then got a DUI and he moved for sole custody. The courthouse was a tiny one in the mountains, built in the 1800's.The room was so small the four of us had to sit at the same table. (usually each side gets their own table.) I got about halfway through my cross-examination of the wife when the judge stopped and asked the lawyers to come into chambers.
In chambers, the Judge said to me, "It's hard enough to take a woman's kids away without you acting like she committed Murder I." Point taken, great advice.The advice has stayed with me all these years. (Now I reserve that attitude for cops and agents, and even then, avoid using the same tone from start to finish.) Nel needs to have a friend point that out to him. He's a advocate, he should present and argue his case without sarcasm, without mocking or belittling the witness' answers, and without denigrating her views. Perhaps if he spent a little more time preparing his cross the night before court, he could get that down and be much more effective. Up until now, he has come across as a pompous meanie. I mute him a lot.
The Judge has expressed her displeasure with his behavior during the trial. I'll bet he pays some kind of "tax" for it in terms of the length of Oscar's sentence. He's not going to get the sentence he wants. Oscar's lawyer, Barry Roux, on the other hand, is a terrific lawyer -- both in temperment and in substance. He may not get everything he wants, but he has good arguments and he is courteous in demeanor. My predictions: The sentence will be closer to what Roux wants than what Nel wants.