According to Guardian, Oscar Pistorius will spend his first
day behind bars on Tuesday after he was sentenced to five years’ jail for
killing his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp.
Looking distressed, the Paralympian clasped the hands of
family members as a police officer led him from the dock down 23 steps – paint
peeling off the handrail – to holding cells below the high court in Pretoria,
the capital of South Africa.
The national prosecuting authority said Pistorius, 27,
would go to prison immediately and would be eligible to be considered for
parole after serving a third of his sentence. His uncle, Arnold Pistorius,
indicated the sprinter would not appeal.
The amputee athlete, known as the “Blade Runner”, stood
staring straight ahead as judge Thokozile Masipa announced his sentence for
culpable homicide. There was a muted reaction from the families on the front
bench of the public gallery after a trial that has otherwise provided high
emotion and drama.
Masipa rejected many of the defence team’s arguments and
described the evidence of one of their witnesses, social worker Annette
Vergeer, as “slapdash and disappointing”. She said she had no reason to believe
that South Africa’s prisons would not be able to cater for the needs of a
disabled person such as Pistorius.
“It would be a sad day for this country if an impression
was created that there is one law for the poor and disadvantaged and another
for the rich and famous,” she noted.
Reference: theguardian
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