Above: The entrance to Oscar Pistorius’ security-estate, Silver Woods Country
Estate, which is part of the Silver Lakes Golf Estate. Silver Lakes was voted the most secure estate in South Africa in 2009. http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2013/feb/14/pistorius-home-estate-most-secure-south-africa
BY TERENCE GRANT
Oscar Pistorius lived in a prestigious security-estate that was surrounded by an electric-fence (mounted on a 3 metre high wall) and patrolled by armed security-guards who controlled access to the complex and maintained a high degree of visibility (particularly at the entrance which looked like the entrance to a military base). As the risk of falling victim to crime (particularly to an armed intrusion) was minimal, residents were prohibited for aesthetic reasons from installing burglar-bars and security-gates. This also applied to the back of the house, which is why Pistorius did not have burglar-bars on his bathroom window or security-gates on his balcony door.
In addition, Pistorius lived a considerable distance from the perimeter of the estate, was less isolated than many of his neighbours (some of whom had vacant plots on all sides), lived in a home that was less impressive than many others, and had 2 highly intimidating dogs – a pit-bull and a particularly ferocious bull-terrier – running loose in the section of garden that led to his bathroom-window. The bathroom window was on the upstairs section of the home, and was always locked at night by Pistorius who, notwithstanding a sophisticated alarm-system, also locked his bedroom and balcony doors (probably more as a precaution against being burgled by someone who lived or worked on the estate, such as a neighbour’s gardener or a neighbour’s child).
Consequently, the fact that Pistorius knew painters had left a ladder in the garden does not explain why the sound of the bathroom–window being opened terrified him to such an extent that he ignored several more likely possibilities, such as the possibility that Reeva (who had spoken to him moments earlier) had gone to the bathroom while he was closing the balcony door (And that he – who had his back turned – hadn’t heard Reeva leave due to the noise the fans were making or the sound of the doors or curtains being closed). This point resonates even more deeply when one considers that he must surely have found it strange that Reeva did not react to the sound of the window opening, and also did not react when he rushed to the bed in pitch–black darkness to fetch his gun, whispering for her to get out of bed and call the police. That it did not occur to him to investigate the lack of a response, or to put out his hand and shake her into action, is exceedingly odd.
Similarly, it is extremely unlikely that someone with a deep interest in firearms and an obsession with being able to defend himself (who has slept in the same bedroom for more than 5 years, giving considerable thought, one imagines, as to how to respond to a burglary) would present his entire body as a target by rushing into the bathroom -on his stumps – to confront an intruder, who could conceivably be carrying a firearm( A far safer option would be to peer down the corridor from the inside of the bedroom, thereby leaving only one arm and part of his head visible to someone firing from the other end of the corridor.) Furthermore, he would almost certainly have been highly relieved to discover the intruder had – instead of standing his ground- retreated into the toilet and slammed the door behind him. Why would an intruder bother to hide from a victim who shouts from the corridor for his housemate to telephone the police, thereby making it obvious there is no point in hiding? Why would someone who intends to put up a fight trap himself in a tiny cubicle that leaves him with little or no idea as to where the victim has positioned himself? More importantly, why would someone living in a secure environment – voted the most secure estate in South Africa in 2009 – fire 4 Black Talon bullets at someone who could be unarmed and eager to surrender?
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TOP:Aerial view of Pistorius’ home
BOTTOM:Photograph showing lack of burglar-bars and security-gates.
TOP AND BOTTOM:Pistorius playing with his dogs.In article printed by British newspaper,MailOnline,Pistorius describes black and white bull-terrier as ‘’mad’’,stating that it on a previous occasion attacked a journalist,’’tearing their toe-nail off and leaving blood all over the place’’. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/olympics/article-2117316/Oscar-Pistorius-exclusive-walking-wild-side.html
Unfortunately, Pistorius is idolised by millions of people, and these fans are notoriously difficult to convince. It hence is important to note the following:
1) It was extremely hot on the night of February 13 2013 (the night before Valentines’ Day). As the air-conditioners had been disconnected for the benefit of the painters, Pistorius placed 2 fans in the entrance to his balcony door, with one leg of the larger fan protruding onto the balcony (the idea being to suck air into the bedroom).
Later, Pistorius felt sleepy and asked Reeva – who was doing her yoga exercises – to close the balcony door before retiring for the night. For some reason Reeva did not comply with his request.
2) Pistorius woke up shortly before 3 am and after a brief chat with Reeva, climbed out of bed to close the balcony door, which was less than 2 metres away from his side of the bed. Although he twice stated in his bail-application that he had gone out onto the balcony, he later insisted under oath that he had never gone onto the balcony. This means that he would always have been in extremely close proximity to Reeva, and would indeed have expected to hear her getting up. This helped him explain why he was certain she was in bed, and also helped him explain how he knew the sound he heard was the sound of the bathroom window being opened. Besides, there was no compelling reason for him to have gone out onto the balcony at 3 am. http://edition.cnn.com/2013/02/19/world/africa/south-africa-pistorius-affadavit/
3) Reeva had just spoken to Pistorius (which also was not mentioned at the bail hearing) and hence knew that she would not disturb him by switching on the bathroom light. Accordingly, the fact that she took her cell-phone to the bathroom at 3 am is somewhat odd, particularly if witnesses are correct about the bathroom light being on. It also is difficult to understand how Pistorius could have failed to notice the light Reeva’s cell-phone would have made, if she were using it to navigate her way to the bathroom.
Furthermore, ex-girlfriend, Samantha Taylor testified that Pistorius did not usually sleep in a pitch-dark bedroom. (“There were things that didn’t match up to my experience of staying at his house’’, she said. For example, while Pistorius claimed during his testimony the bedroom was pitch black so he didn’t see Steenkamp go to the bathroom, Taylor said Pistorius did not typically keep his room that dark. ’’He usually slept with the curtains fairly open. He always had some light coming in, ’’said Taylor. http://abcnews.go.com/International/oscar-pistorius-girlfriend-thought-couldve/story?id=25428694 )
4) At the trial Pistorius explained that intruders could have walked past his dogs without them barking because they were placid and un-aggressive ( ’’They were very placid and they are loving dogs. They are quite calm, contrary to the names of the animals, my pit-bull and bull-terrier I always leave around you know, if I had friends over they would interact and if they would play with kids; they were not at all aggressive.’’(‘’Behind the door, page 462)
However, in an interview given to a British newspaper about a year before the shooting ,Pistorius described his bull-terrier as ‘‘mad’’, and claimed it had attacked a journalist ,’’tearing their toe-nail off (sic)and leaving blood all over the place’’. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/olympics/article-2117316/Oscar-Pistorius-exclusive-walking-wild-side.html
5) Pistorius was a poor witness and at times appeared untruthful:
- A) He claimed that he had never heard of a zombie-stopper but later was forced to admit that he had used the term himself in a video posted on YouTube
http://www.timeslive.co.za/local/2014/04/09/i-have-never-heard-the-term-zombie-stopper-pistorius.
B)He stated that he had fired because he thought his life, and Reeva’s , was at risk but later claimed that he had not intended to fire(that he had fired accidentally/without thinking ).
- C) He claimed that a gun that had gone off (months before the shooting) in Tasha’s Restaurant had gone off by itself (that his finger was not even on the trigger).
- D) He claimed that Reeva had died downstairs in his arms, which was contradicted by the medical and forensic experts who agreed that Reeva would have died almost immediately after being shot in the head.
- E) Pistorius told investigators he had forgotten the password to the cell-phone that allegedly was removed from the crime-scene by his brother Carl, who apparently deleted all messages and narrowly escaped prosecution after the defence agreed not to challenge the states chain of evidence relating to the cell-phones. According to the book ‘’Behind the door’’, a challenge to the chain of evidence would have forced the prosecutor, Adv. Nel , to call the original investigating-officer ,Hilton Botha ,to the stand, which Nel was exceedingly reluctant to do. In addition, there was no way of knowing what had been said in the deleted messages.
Consequently, Carl Pistorius’ highly suspicious behaviour was not brought to Judge Masipa’s attention. http://www.news24.com/Archives/City-Press/How-Carl-Pistorius-dodged-a-charge-20150429
http://ewn.co.za/2014/10/02/Pistorius-the-Hulk-and-Babyshoes-What-the-court-didnt-hear ))
6) It was not shown that someone else was responsible for the lengthy argument that Estelle van der Merwe-who lived 97 m away- heard before the shots were fired and it hence is probable that she did indeed hear Pistorius and Steenkamp arguing . http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/Oscar_Pistorius/2nd-witness-says-fighting-kept-her-awake-20140304 The fact that no-one else seems to have heard the argument is not surprising when one considers that most people would have been asleep. Furthermore, there could have been a pause in the argument when security-guards were passing at 02:20 am.
7) Reeva’s What’sapp message and testimony from other witnesses(Samantha Taylor in particular) proved beyond the shadow of all doubt , that Pistorius was an insecure, jealous and controlling person, who lost his temper easily . Unbelievably, this evidence was swept aside by Judge Masipa, who in finding him guilty of culpable homicide, naively noted that Oscar and Reeva had a loving relationship (as if to say that people who are passionately in love are less likely to fly into jealous rages than people who are less passionate about each other) In similar vein, she noted-in an emphatic manner- that Pistorius’ grief was genuine (as if to say that people who lose their tempers or commit crimes of passion rarely, if ever, regret their actions) and also noted-again in an emphatic manner- that Pistorius immediately claimed to have killed Reeva by accident (as if to say that Pistorius explanation was fairly unique, and therefore would have required considerable thought). While one must condemn in the harshest terms those who make threats against judges and magistrates, one must also concede – out of deference to the truth – that it is not particularly surprising that a few hotheads allegedly threatened to kill Judge Masipa, which resulted in her being placed under police-protection. http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/oscar-pistorius-trial-judge-thokozile-masipa-under-heavy-police-protection-following-threats-1465938
Nor is it surprising that the SCA, in overturning her verdict (and convicting Pistorius of common-murder/murder dolus eventualis), felt the need to mention that verdicts often get overturned on appeal.
Judge Masipa’s verdict was, in the opinion of many, a whitewash of monumental proportion.
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ABOVE: Photograph of Pistorius’ bedroom indicating how close the balcony door was to his bed.
BELOW: Diagram of bedroom and bathroom
ABOVE: Pistorius (at his uncle’s home) demonstrates how he walked on his stumps.
BELOW: Corridor leading to Pistorius’ bathroom.
Jenna Edkins had a special place in Oscar’s heart: Firstly, she started dating him before he became super-rich and world-famous; secondly she was a friend of the family and thirdly had spent time in the company of Oscar’s beloved mother on countless occasions. Consequently, she was a link to the past -the closest thing to a soul-mate that Oscar had ever known- , and must have been a huge threat to Reeva, who knew that Jenna had dumped Oscar over a fling he had with Samantha Taylor and probably would have had little difficulty in luring him away from her. (According to the book, “Behind the Door”, by Mandy Wiener and Barry Bateman, Samantha Taylor confirmed that Jenna was at the centre of her break-up with Oscar.) Consequently, it is interesting to note that Oscar had a 9 minute telephonic conversation with Jenna on the night before Valentine’s Day, and had her listed on his cell-phone as “BabyShoes”. Could Reeva perhaps have examined Oscar’s cell-phone while he was sleeping (or out of the room), and later confronted him about this 9 minute call to BabyShoes?
The answer to this question is that 26 year old males often fly into rages for little or no reason (particularly when “herbal remedies’’ containing testosterone are involved )and that the prosecution therefore should not be expected/required to explain exactly what happened on that tragic morning. http://espn.go.com/olympics/trackandfield/story/_/id/8994977/oscar-pistorius-reps-say-substance-herbal-remedy-not-steroids
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Postscript
Pistorius did not have much of a relationship with his father Henke, who dated 1974 Miss World, Anneline Kriel for 3 years and once shot himself in the testicles while cleaning a gun in front of her http://www.timeslive.co.za/thetimes/2014/07/01/the-blonde-ambition-of-oscar-s-dad
Consequently, Pistorius was, for all intents and purposes, orphaned at the age of 15 when his mother died and, upon becoming world-famous, would not have had anyone to bring him down to earth…to let him know that he was getting too big for his boots .This would have been particularly true of overseas trips, where he was surrounded by people who were paid to treat him like royalty/the bees knees. Consequently, one does not want to be too hard on him, for what happened to him could so easily have happened to any of us. Being worshipped by millions of adoring fans is bound to lead to an inflated ego and a sense of entitlement.
Unfortunately, Pistorius has chosen to portray himself as a victim of a tragic mistake, and his battle with fame is therefore of no significance whatsoever.
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EXCERPT FROM WARRANT OFFICER MARITZ’ TESTIMONY
‘’The state’s next witness was a Warrant Officer Maritz from the local Boschkop Police Station. In a very short stint on the stand, Maritz gave evidence as to the relative safety of Pistorius’ Silver Woods Estate: 8 crimes between 2011 and 2013, of which just one was a house robbery and just one shooting – Steenkamp’s. The state will doubtless return to this in closing arguments to argue that it was unreasonable for Pistorius to feel himself so desperately under threat in such an environment.
In cross-examination, Roux made the point that Maritz’s crime database only includes those crimes reported to the police, which Maritz conceded. Roux also suggested that Pistorius had been a victim of crime on countless occasions. With sarcasm, Nel responded in re-examination that there should presumably be some evidence of these crimes on the police database. Maritz agreed that unless Pistorius’s name or ID number had been entered into the system wrongly, this should indeed be the case’’.http://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2014-03-25-pistorius-trial-week-4-day-2/
EXCERPT FROM BAIL APPLICATION AFFIDAVIT
“During the early morning hours of 14 February 2013, I woke up, went onto the balcony to bring the fan in and closed the sliding doors, the blinds and the curtains. I heard a noise in the bathroom and realised that someone was in the bathroom…
With the benefit of hindsight I believe that Reeva went to the toilet when I went out on the balcony to bring the fan in. I cannot bear to think of the suffering I have caused her and her family, knowing how much she was loved. I also know that the events of that tragic night were as I have described them and that in due course I have no doubt the police and expert investigators will bear this out’’. http://edition.cnn.com/2013/02/19/world/africa/south-africa-pistorius-affadavit/
Whatsapp message in which Reeva complains of Oscar’s jealous tantrums http://edition.cnn.com/2014/03/24/world/oscar-pistorius-trial-whatsapp-messages/
ABOVE: Pistorius with Reeva Steenkamp.
RS to OP: I’m not 100% sure why I’m sitting down to type you a message first but perhaps it says a lot about what’s going on here. Today was one of my best friend’s engagements and I wanted to stay longer I was enjoying myself but it’s over now. You have picked on me incessantly since you got back from CT (Cape Town) and I understand that you are sick but it’s nasty. Yesterday wasn’t nice for either of us but we managed to pull through and communicate well enough to show our care for each other is greater than the drama that attacked us. I was not flirting with anyone today. I feel sick that you suggested that and that you made a scene at the table and made us leave early. I’m terribly disappointed in how the day ended and how you left me. We are living in a double standard relationship where you can be mad about how I deal with stuff when you are very quick to act cold and offish when you’re unhappy. Every 5 seconds I hear how you dated another chick. You really have dated a lot of people yet you get upset if I mention ONE funny story with a long term boyfriend. I do everything to make you happy and to not say anything to rock the boat with u. You do everything to throw tantrums in front of people. I have been upset by you for 2 days now. I’m so upset I left Darren’s party early. SO upset. I can’t get that day back. I’m scared of you sometimes and how u snap at me and of how you will react to me. You make me happy 90% of the time and I think we are amazing together but I am not some other bitch you may know trying to kill your vibe. I am the girl who let go with u even when I was scared out of my mind to. I’m the girl who fell in love with u and wanted to tell u this weekend. But I’m also the girl that gets sidestepped when you are in a s**t mood. When I feel you think u have me so why try anymore. I get snapped at and told my accents and voices are annoying. I touch your neck to show u I care and you tell me to stop. Stop chewing gum. Do this don’t do that. You don’t want to hear stuff cut me off. Your endorsements your reputation your impression of someone innocent blown out of proportion and f***ed up a special day for me. I’m sorry if you truly felt I was hitting on my friend Sams husband and I’m sorry that u think that little of me. From the outside I think it looks like we are a struggle and maybe that’s what we are. I just want to love and be loved. Be happy and make someone SO happy. Maybe we can’t do that for each other. Cos right now I know u aren’t happy and I am certainly very unhappy and sad.
Email in which Pistorius explains his feelings for Jenna to his then girl-friend Samantha Taylor:
Everyone has their darkness, yet everyone has a burning desire to find that one person that understands them. There emotion without a flinch. Jenna and I started dating when I was 20, I met her and fell for her pretty quickly. I had grown up with her cousins and on the weekends that my brother sister and I were able to see my dad, my mom being friend with Jenna’s mom and aunt would take Jenna to church. It was surprising that we had only met some years after my mom had passed but this immediately drew me closer to her. I don’t talk about my mom and dad to anyone as it wasn’t a pretty picture, not the one I became accustomed to portraying as a kid anyway. The fact that mom had known Jenna meant a lot to me and was one of the base notes of our relationship, which maybe kept it together long after it should’ve ended. Jenna and I started dating and in the beginning everything seemed like it was perfect. She understood me and was willing to support me no matter what. (“Behind the Door”, page 384)
Excerpts from Pistorius’ book:
‘’I found myself struggling to make sense of the things around me. Some of it went to my head, and looking back I regret a lot of the decisions I ended up making…I had to deal with a lot of travelling and found myself wandering away from her. I met a girl later that year and in my mind made myself believe that this is what I had been looking for. I fell quickly and I fell fast for this girl but within a couple of weeks I realized I had been so desperate to chase something that wasn’t there that I had made myself believe it was. Jenna and I got back together. After months of trying to make it work I realized that I had broken her trust and called things off. A couple of weeks later I found what I thought I had been looking for, but it didn’t take me long to realize that it was my desperation and loneliness coming back to get me.’’(Behind the Door, page 384)
2)’’I ended up in a coma for 6 days after being airlifted. It breaks my heart when people joke about it and me being pissed because I can’t remember everything about that night like it just happened and I thought I was going to die…I called my brother and sister and thanked them for always staying by my side and called Jenna even though we hadn’t spoken in weeks to apologise for being a lost (dumb) fuck and playing with her heart. It wasn’t my intention to hurt her but like I have so many times by being selfish done so. When I woke up in Milpark Jenna had slept next to my bed for 6 days, she was in the middle of varsity exams and had her books all over the room.’’ (“Behind the Door”, page 385)
Article in which Samantha Taylor states that another problem was the ‘’persistent presence’’ of ex-girlfriend Jenna Edkins http://www.news.com.au/world/hes-got-quite-a-short-temper-there-were-many-times-the-gun-was-a-little-scary/news-story/a65bb6d278bd90d8720eaaa57c1db7d8
ABOVE: Pistorius with Jenna Edkins, with whom he had a 5-year on-off relationship.
ABOVE: Henk Pistorius with former Miss World Anneline Kriel.
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