Johannesburg (AFP) – Former South African Paralympic champion Oscar Pistorius, who was convicted of murdering his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp a decade ago, is unlikely to be released immediately if he is granted parole on Friday, a lawyer for the victim’s family said.
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The country’s parole board said on Monday it would “review the profile of Oscar Pistorius on Friday, November 24, 2023.”
But even if Pistorius’ application was successful, the former athlete would have to wait weeks before being released from prison pending an “internal process” by the Department of Correctional Services (DCS), according to the Steenkamp family’s lawyer, Tania Cohen. .
If “parole is granted, DCS follows an internal process, which is usually within a month,” Koen told AFP.
Several legal experts interviewed by AFP said the time between a parole decision and a prisoner’s release varies from case to case — with some suggesting the wait could depend on “political expediency”.
The double amputee, who began serving his sentence in 2014, lost his first bid for parole in March.
DCS said he had not completed the minimum period of detention required to be released.
Prisoners in South Africa are automatically eligible for parole after serving half of their sentence.
Pistorius, who turns 37 on Wednesday, is believed to have served more than half, having started his term in 2014.
But after several appeals of his original conviction followed, authorities set their count from his latest conviction to less than half.
The Constitutional Court overturned this process last month, ruling that the count should start from the date of the first degree a prisoner was put behind bars.
Pistorius killed Reeva Steenkamp, a model, in the early hours of Valentine’s Day 2013, shooting four times through the bathroom door of his high-security Pretoria home in a killing that shocked the world.
Arrested in the early hours of February 2013, he had pleaded not guilty and denied killing Steenkamp in a rage, saying he mistook her for a burglar.
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