PRETORIA: Oscar Pistorius was convicted of culpable homicide Friday for shooting his lover Reeva Steenkamp, but walked free on bail ahead of what could still be a stiff prison sentence.
South African Judge Thokozile Masipa acquitted Pistorius of murder, but found he acted “negligently” in killing the law graduate and fashion model by firing at her through a bathroom door. Pistorius claims he mistook her for an intruder.
Steenkamp’s parents reacted with disbelief. “I just don’t feel that this is the right [verdict],” mother June Steenkamp told America’s NBC News a little after Masipa found Pistorius not guilty of murder.
Steenkamp said her 29-year-old daughter had died a “horrible, painful, terrible death.”
“And I can’t believe that they believe that it was an accident,” she said in her reaction to the judgment.
Pistorius said he shot Reeva in the dead of the night after he mistook her for an intruder.
Asked what kind of sentence she would like to see imposed on Pistorius, the mother said: “I really don’t care what happens to Oscar, it’s not going to change anything because my daughter is not gonna come back ... She is gone forever.”
The 27-year-old athlete – whose journey from disabled infant to Olympic sprinter inspired the world – will hear his punishment when sentencing begins Oct. 13.
His trial had heard that in the early hours of Valentine’s Day last year, he fired four pistol rounds into a locked toilet door, hitting Steenkamp, causing her head to “explode” and “amputating” her arm.
Masipa, dismissing swaths of state evidence as inconclusive or irrelevant, ruled that on the charge of murder “the accused is found not guilty. Instead he is found guilty of culpable homicide.”
Pistorius stared straight ahead as the conviction was read, showing little emotion.
But from the courtroom gallery there were sniffles and shallow breaths as friends and family of 29-year-old Steenkamp wept.
Culpable homicide carries no mandatory sentence under South African law.
But Masipa – who has a reputation for handing out stiff sentences – could decide to fine Pistorius or put him behind bars for more than a decade.
Speaking after the verdict, Pistorius’s uncle Arnold said the damage done to the athlete’s career and life as a result of the trial had been “tragic.”
“We always knew the facts,” the family spokesman said, “and we never had any doubt in Oscar’s version of this tragic incident.”
But lawyers and crime-weary South Africans voiced surprise and even anger that Pistorius had been found not guilty of murder.
The National Prosecuting Authority said it was “disappointed” with the verdict, but had not yet decided on whether to appeal.
“We respect the court’s decision to convict the accused on culpable homicide, which is a serious crime,” said spokesperson Nathi Mncube.
Outside the court Trevor, a 52-year-old pastor from Pretoria, said the verdict showed that justice favored the rich in this country of staggering inequality.
“If he didn’t have money he would be in jail,” he said.
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