The Herald (South Africa)

Reeva’s sister slates ‘insensitiv­e’ Oscar series

- Chrizelda Kekana

Reeva Steenkamp’s sister‚ Simone Cowburn, has lambasted the creators of the four-part Amazon Prime docuseries Pistorius for using grisly crime scene photos of her sister’s body.

The documentar­y series, which is based on Oscar Pistorius’s rise to worldwide stardom and his fall from grace after the murder of his girlfriend Steenkamp in 2013, was released on Thursday last week.

In an interview with Mail Online, Cowburn called the series insensitiv­e for using pictures of Steenkamp’s body‚ as well as pictures of a bloodspatt­ered bathroom.

“My parents are not young at all. I am worried this will have a terrible effect on them.

“My father has been really unwell recently and has heart problems,” she said.

“My question is, how did these documentar­y people get their hands on police photograph­s of my sister’s body?”

Cowburn said she did not see the purpose of the documentar­y other than inflicting pain on her family.

“I don’t understand why this film has been made. She was killed five years ago and you would think that everything that needed to be said has been said now.

“I spend a lot of time shielding my parents from what is on the internet about Reeva.

“We don’t need pictures of her bloodstain­s to be seen at all after such a long time.”

Pistorius is serving 13 years in prison for murder.

This after the National Prosecutin­g Authority approached the Supreme Court of Appeal to overturn his six-year prison sentence‚ arguing that it was “shockingly low”, in December 2017.

Prosecutor Andrea Johnston argued that the disgraced athlete did not show remorse and had not told the Pretoria High Court why he had shot Steenkamp.

“There is no gut-wrenching remorse.”–

Newspapers in English

Newspapers from South Africa