Oscar Pistorius (b1986) was born in the Transvaal, South Africa. As a toddler he was diagnosed with the rare medical condition, Fibular Hemimelia. At a year old, both his legs were amputated below the knees.
He studied at Pretoria Boys High School, and played rugby. Oscar only stopped competitive rugby when he severely hurt himself in a game. Instead, he tried wrestling, water polo and tennis. Disability was not an excuse for Oscar to isolate himself nor did being physically challenged dampen his spirits; he went on to become a renowned athlete.
Pistorius met coach Ampie Louw and prosthetist Francois Van Der Watt early in 2004. The two men encouraged Pistorius to try professional running, Van der Watt helping him get perfectly customised running blades. That year he participated in the 2004 Summer Paralympics event, in which he achieved a 3rd place in the 100 ms.
He clearly shocked the sporting world with his amazing athletic skills, by winning more than a dozen gold medals in his events. In 2005 he participated in the Paralympic World Cup. Plus he covered 400 metres in just 47.34 seconds in the able-bodied South African championship event.
Pistorius returned to Pretoria Uni in 2006. In 2007, he participated in the South African Senior Athletics Championship events, creating history by winning in the 100, 200 and 400 ms events in excellent times.
BT Paralympics World Cup Athletics in Manchester, May 2011
However Pistorius was criticised by the International Association of Athletic Federations/IAAF. IAAF concluded that allowing Pistorius to participate was unfair to other athletes because his specially-made J-shaped artificially legs gave him an edge over them. Nonetheless a determined Oscar appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport in 2008; the outcome was that Pistorius could continue running again.
His dream to participate in the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics was turned down by a sports committee of South Africa. Instead he participated in the 2008 Summer Paralympics event held that year. Oscar then took part in Manchester’s 2011 Paralympic World Cup and proved that he was one of the best sprinters in the world.
His dream to participate in the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics was turned down by a sports committee of South Africa. Instead he participated in the 2008 Summer Paralympics event held that year. Oscar then took part in Manchester’s 2011 Paralympic World Cup and proved that he was one of the best sprinters in the world.
His Olympic dream came true when he become the first amputee to compete in the regular Olympics, taking part in London’s 2012 Summer Olympics. He ran in a heat of the men's 400-meter and advanced to the semi-finals! Oscar even secured a place in Time magazine’s “100 Most Influential People in the World”.
The Laureus World sports award for Sportsperson of the Year with a disability,
Feb 2012, The South African
Almost as an aside, Pistorius was indicted on 2 gun-related charges, before 2013. Both cases were in Johannesburg.
The Killing
Pistorius (aged 28) created a tragedy in 2013 when he killed his beautiful live-in girlfriend-model Reeva Steenkamp (1983–2013) with his licensed pistol. Although his girlfriend was not in bed when Pistorius jumped up, he still shot an “unknown” person 4 times through the locked bathroom door. He was long known to be very controlling of women, even when he heard Reeva crying.
Almost as an aside, Pistorius was indicted on 2 gun-related charges, before 2013. Both cases were in Johannesburg.
The Killing
Pistorius (aged 28) created a tragedy in 2013 when he killed his beautiful live-in girlfriend-model Reeva Steenkamp (1983–2013) with his licensed pistol. Although his girlfriend was not in bed when Pistorius jumped up, he still shot an “unknown” person 4 times through the locked bathroom door. He was long known to be very controlling of women, even when he heard Reeva crying.
This handsome, university educated, white, famous athlete claimed the killing was not deliberate. So he was granted bail later that year, since the judiciary agreed the killing was unintentional. In 2014 the athlete was gaoled for 5 years after being charged with culpable homicide-manslaughter. Prosecutors appealed against the manslaughter finding and secured a murder conviction in 2015.
Pistorius was sentenced to 6 years in prison for murder, but prosecutors re-appealed against what they called a shockingly lenient punishment. In 2017 the Supreme Court of Appeal in Bloemfontein gave Pistorius the minimum 15 years prescribed for murder in South Africa, less time already served.
Parole
8 years after murdering Reeva, Pistorius became legally eligible for parole after serving half his sentence but it was a huge surprise for Barry and June Steenkamp when corrections officials contacted them in Oct 2021. They believed their daughter’s murderer would not be eligible until 2023! That scheduled parole hearing was delayed because a full report on Pistorius’ time in prison was unavailable. So Pistorius’ face-to-face meeting with the Steenkamps still must happen before a parole hearing can go ahead, as is their right under South Africa’s victim-offender dialogue policy. The Steenkamps need to challenge Pistorius on why he shot Reeva in her bathroom! And Oscar knows that parole boards DO consider the opinion of victims families before releasing any offender.
The double-amputee blade-runner champion from South Africa did not even lose his eight Paralympic medals (6 gold, 1 silver, 1 bronze) after being found guilty of murder. So all my South African friends are not at all confident that the star will be kept securely in gaol for the rest of his sentence.
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29 comments:
Murderer.
In 2012 I watched him win a gold medal in the London Paralympics. I also saw him coaching and encouraging some young athletes and thought he was a really nice guy. The news of the murder shocked me. Just shows you can't judge a book by its cover.
Impressive guy in so many ways, but came across as unlikable and (sorry, I don't know all the facts), the death of that beautiful girl simply never made sense. Tragic waste.
I read the evidence of Samantha, his previous girlfriend, who said Pistorius controlled her with guns and lunatic driving speeds. This girl was young, but smart enough to know the dead body could have been her.
His looks never really appealed to me.
I always thought his 'springs' gave him an unfair advantage.
While I know the story well enough, I don't remember about his two previous firearm incidents.
It took some doing by the South Africa legal system but so far it has succeeded. We will see about the future.
In these tragic cases I usually find myself accusing the third party - the parents.
Yes, the parents who seem to have ignored the quite visible gaps : of age, mentality, health,etc..and done nothing about their child's romantic choice.
Hi Hels - he certainly inspired many in 2012 - we don't know what happened - just desperately sad his girl-friend died. DUTA has a good view of the situation. All the best - Hilary
Rachel
totally true, but remember that the jury agreed the killing was unintentional. In 2014 the athlete was gaoled for 5 years after being charged found guilty of manslaughter.
Fun
Agreed. That was the key complaint raised by the prosecutors who appealed against the manslaughter finding, to support Reeva's family and every women's group in the nation. The fact that a top class athlete, coach and support system for young athletes was so nice.. told us nothing about his mental state and his faith in guns.
Mike
my aim in raising Oscar Pistorius' brilliant athletic career and his dismal murder-court-prison career was because of the me2 issue all over the world. Three Australian ministers have been blamed for sexual abuse of their staff or other politicians in the last 2 years, but I haven't heard of any charges yet, let alone gaol sentences. And in South Africa, no police, jury or judge wanted to do the right thing about Oscar because he was soooooo famous.
LMK
Samantha Taylor was a very brave young woman, yes indeed. Since there was no witness to the death of Reeva, Taylor had to be the rare and valuable witness for the prosecution, telling of the pain she had endured while they were dating.
https://abcnews.go.com/International/oscar-pistorius-girlfriend-thought-couldve/story?id=25428694
Andrew
Let me mention just one firearm crime, before Reeva was murdered. At lunchtime in Jan 2013 Pistorius and his friends were at a restaurant in upmarket Johannesburg. Pistorius' shot went off in the restaurant, then there was blood but fortunately no fatality. Oscar asked his friend Fresco to say he was responsible for the shot.
On Sept 2014, the judge delivered a verdict that Pistorius was guilty of reckless endangerment with a firearm at a restaurant. He was sentenced to a maximum of five years for his major charge (manslaughter of Reeva) with a concurrent three-year suspended prison sentence for reckless gun endangerment!
DUTA
I was/am much more aware of Reeva's parents all through the years since her death in 2013.
But Oscar's parents were rarely discussed. Oscar's father divorced his mother early in the children's lives and virtually wasn't seen again. Oscar's mother was much loved, but she died from a brain haemorrhage at an early age. And in 2014 Oscar's brother Carl was badly hurt in a front-on car crash.
Hilary
we were also totally thrilled by his stirling sporting successes in the 2011 Paralympic World Cup and the 2012 Summer Olympic Games.. he was a total inspiration. There weren't too many names of limbless athletes that people could name, but everyone knew Oscar Pistorius' name.
Later I was devastated when we found that Oscar had access to a legal gun, and was facing a number of different charges as well as murder. We have so many ex-South African friends here, and they were heartbroken.
Why did Pistorius get to keep all his medals? So many athletes had their medals stripped for blood doping, testosterone usage, asking a clean athlete to give his urine instead of someone else's dirty sample, breaching amateurism laws and so on. Let alone murder, rape or terrorism.
Joe
most of the records about athletes losing their medals came from the Olympic Games, not the Paralympic Games which is where Oscar Pistorius won his amazing 8 medals. Examine this article on Olympians who have been busted for serious crimes.
https://www.cheatsheet.com/culture/7-olympic-athletes-whove-been-busted-for-serious-crimes.html/
I found very few Paralympic medals withdrawn from the winners, and those that were withdrawn had nothing to do with post-Game crimes eg Spain was stripped of their intellectual disability basketball gold medals in 2000 because the athletes had not undergone medical tests to establish their disability. And a German skier became the first Winter Paralympian to test positive for steroids at the 2002 Winter Paralympics, so his two gold medals were stripped.
While he had never been arrested on any domestic violence charge in the past, see Pistorius' history of previous violence and controlling behaviour toward women. For example he allegedly broke a woman’s leg after he slammed a door and then punched it during a party at his house in 2009, causing a panel to fall on her. Pistorius reached an out-of-court settlement with that woman, South African blogger Cassidy in late 2013. He reportedly settled because his lawyers advised him he could not be embroiled in both civil and criminal legal battles at the same time.
In 1914 The Guardian reported that Pistorius was found guilty of reckless endangerment for shooting off a gun in a restaurant a month before the deadly incident. This time he was tried and found guilty.
https://www.oxygen.com/true-crime-buzz/did-oscar-pistorius-have-history-of-domestic-violence-before-murder
Many thanks
I knew about the reckless shooting off Oscar's gun in a restaurant and how he randomly shot his gun out of the open sunroof of a car last year. But I have no idea why it was so difficult to charge Pistorius with a number of serious offences, before Reeva Steenkamp was nurdered.
Hello Hels, I remember when Pistorius was the wonder of the world. Apparently everyone was so amazed by his athleticism that they thought his moral framework was equally sterling. From the reports at the time, I thought he was clearly guilty. Once again an ambient gun caused an innocent death. I recall many defenses for his having a gun--the crime rate, his disabilities, etc. However, he clearly shot first and asked questions later, and probably was itching to use that gun. Recently Phil Spector, one of the most important people in his field and era, died at an old age in Jail from Covid. Spector was another gun nut, and ended up killing someone. His wealth, age and position did not save him. People such as Pistorius and Spector are (excuse the apt metaphor) like loaded guns ready to go off.
--Jim
Parnassus
Pistorius' athleticism was indeed so stunning that the sports world was blown away. But that told the world nothing whatsoever about his moral framework. In fact it actively protected Pistorius from close inspection, as you say, even when lots of events en route to murdering Reeva Steenkamp were begging for police intervention.
I know that he had a terrible infancy and childhood, and that couldn't have helped. But he was a national hero and a sporting celebrity.. both of which clearly protected him from an honest examination in South Africa. And elsewhere, as you noted.
Boa tarde. Parabéns pelo seu excelente trabalho. Mais prefiro deixar o julgamento com as autoridades. Bom início de semana.
Boa tarde. Parabéns pelo seu excelente trabalho. Mais prefiro deixar o julgamento com as autoridades. Bom início de semana.
https://viagenspelobrasilerio.blogspot.com/
Luiz
it is a tough one. The trial is long over, but as part of the scheduled parole hearing, both parties (the killer and the victim's parents) have to fulfil the victim-offender dialogue policy. That should be very soon.
I think its important to not consider the beauty of the victim or the heroism of the athletic perpetrator . Surely we need to focus on the evidence and the evidence suggests that Oscar is Trigger happy at best and a controlling domestic thug capable of murder at worst . I think he got what he deserved and I hope that he might have some opportunity to redeem himself in future . As for Duta ,s response ,as the mother of Adult children I know only too well that you cant influence them much except by example and discussion , in the end their mistakes are theirs.
mem
if only your view was accepted by the police, lawyers, judges etc. It has been common that the national heroism of an athletic perpetrator is just about the ONLY thing that is considered.
Mike Tyson was eventually convicted on serious crimes including rape, road rage and narcotics, and spent a total of a year in prison for these crimes. OJ Simpson was found not guilty in the murders of his ex-wife and her friend. (Mind you, Simpson was convicted of armed robbery, assault with a deadly weapon, burglary and conspiracy later on, and did spend some years in prison).
Luiz
I know you wanted to wait for the authorities' decision re parole, but I still haven't heard what happened.
At Dream Thanks for this amazing content.
Oscar Pistorius was denied parole after serving eight years in prison for killing Reeva Steenkamp. South Africa's Department of Correctional Services said in a statement announcing the decision Pistorius had not yet completed the minimum detention period "as ruled by the Supreme Court of Appeal". Pistorius will not face the parole board again until August 2024. He was originally sentenced to 13 years and five months in prison.
Thank you ABC News
I was quite certain that Oscar Pistorius would be released quietly at the first possible moment. Thank goodness that, despite the fact that he was VERY famous, very talented, good looking and self confident, the Supreme Court of Appeal did not cave into his demands.
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