Oscar Pistorius jail term more than doubled
Appeal judges grant bid to extend ‘shockingly lenient’ sentence on killer
Oscar Pistorius’s prison sentence was more than doubled to 13 years and five months yesterday.
The extension was a surprisingly dramatic intervention by South Africa’s Supreme Court of Appeal in the Olympic athlete’s fate after the murder of girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp.
In an announcement that took a matter of minutes, Supreme Court Justice Willie Seriti said a panel of judges unanimously upheld an appeal by prosecutors against Pistorius’s original six-year sentence for shooting Ms Steenkamp multiple times in his home in 2013.
Under that initial sentence, which the court called “shockingly lenient”, the doubleamputee runner could have been released on parole in mid-2019.
Now, the earliest he will be eligible for parole is 2023.
Therulingcouldfinallybring an end to the near five-year legal saga surrounding Pistorius, a multiple Paralympic champion and record-breaker who was the first amputee to run at the Olympics and one of the most celebrated sportsmen in the world.
Ms Steenkamp’s parents, Barry and June, were “emotional” as they watched Mr Seriti deliver the verdict live on television at their home, family lawyer Tania Koen said.
“They feel there has been justice for Reeva. She can now rest in peace,” Ms Koen said. “But at the same time, people must realise that people think this is the end of the road for them … the fact is they still live with Reeva’s loss every day.”
Pistorius killed Ms Steenkamp in the pre-dawn hours of Valentine’s Day 2013 after shooting four times through a closed toilet cubicle door with his 9mm pistol. He claimed he mistook the 29-year-old model and reality TV star for an intruder and was initially convicted of manslaughter by trial judge Thokozile Masipa.
That conviction was overturned and replaced with a murder conviction by the Supreme Court in 2015. Pistorius was then sentenced to six years for murder by Ms Masipa, a decision also now rejected by the Supreme Court.
Prosecutors called the sixyear sentence much too lenient and the Supreme Court agreed, saying in a full written ruling released later that “the sentence of six years’ imprisonment is shockingly lenient to a point where it has the effect of trivialising this serious offence”.
The Supreme Court said that Pistorius “displays a lack of remorse, and does not appreciate the gravity of his actions”.
Pistorius’ brother, Carl, wrote on Twitter: “Shattered. Heartbroken. Gutted.”
Pistorius should have been sentenced to the prescribed minimum of 15 years for murder, Mr Seriti said, as he delivered the verdict of a panel of five judges at the Supreme Court in the central city of Bloemfontein. There is no death penalty in South Africa. The new sentence of 13 years and five months took into account the one year and seven months Pistorius served in prison and under house arrest after his manslaughter conviction.
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