Former South African Paralympic champion Oscar Pistorius left prison on Friday, discreetly and avoiding the gaze of the cameras, and is “now at home” on parole, almost 11 years after the murder of his partner Reeva Steenkamp.
• Also read: South Africa: Oscar Pistorius is conditionally released
The 37-year-old former athlete, who had both his legs amputated, was convicted of murder in a case that captivated the world and has served more than half of his sentence, left Atteridgeville Prison in the suburbs of the capital Pretoria early this morning .
“He has been accepted into the community corrections system and is now at home,” the prison authority said in a statement confirming the conditional release is now effective.
Neither the timing nor the logistical details were previously disclosed by authorities, citing “security reasons.” AFP journalists noted that vehicles left the prison early in the morning, but tinted windows prevented any visibility.
The six-time Paralympics champion is prohibited from speaking to the media. His freedom of movement is limited to the suburb of Waterkloof, near Pretoria, where his uncle's wealthy estate is located.
In a written statement obtained by AFP minutes before Pistorius's release was announced, the victim's mother said that Reeva Steenkamp's relatives were “sentenced for life.”
“We who are still here are condemned to life,” lamented June Steenkamp. She wonders if “reeva has had justice” and if “Oscar has served enough time,” declaring, “There can be no justice because her loved one will never come back.”
The Steenkamp family has not officially spoken out against the former champion's conditional release. But June Steenkamp has always said she doesn't believe “Oscar's version of the facts” and believes he has “failed to rehabilitate” himself in prison.
Anger management
On the night of February 13-14, 2013, Oscar Pistorius killed 29-year-old model Reeva Steenkamp by shooting four times through her bedroom bathroom door in his high-security Pretoria home.
A year earlier, the athlete had become a legend by competing alongside able-bodied athletes in the 400 meters at the London Olympics, a first for a double amputee.
Pistorius was arrested early on the morning of Valentine's Day 2013 and denied shooting in a fit of rage and claimed to have believed there was a burglar present. A version he maintained throughout the legal saga and which kept the media in suspense for the next four years.
At the end of his first trial, which opened in 2014 and was broadcast live on television, the runner, nicknamed “Blade Runner” in reference to his carbon prostheses, received five years in prison for manslaughter.
But the public prosecutor considers the sentence to be “scandalously lenient” and is calling for it to be reclassified as murder. After several calls and the victim's crude reading of an autopsy report, which caused the defendant to vomit, he was finally sentenced to 13 years and five months in prison for murder at the end of 2017.
Under South African law, a convict is entitled to a sentence change once half of his sentence has expired. At the end of November, prison authorities announced the early release of Oscar Pistorius.
As part of his probation until the end of his sentence in 2029, Oscar Pistorius must complete anger management therapy and a violence against women program.
He is not allowed to consume alcohol. He must also do community service, but must be present at a specific Waterkloof house at certain times of the day.