Oscar Pistorius’s siblings slam court’s ‘math errors’. Oscar Pistorius‘ brothers Carl and Aimee released a statement the day after he was turned down for parole, accusing the Supreme Court of Appeal and the parole board of making “mathematical errors.”
The former Paralympian’s sister and sibling also provided a timeline of events that they say “proves” he qualifies for parole.
Oscar Pistorius’s siblings slam court’s ‘math errors’
Oscar was reportedly not serving his minimum sentence for the 2013 murder of his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp, which led to his denial of an early release on Friday, March 31. In 16 months, or in August 2024, Oscar will be available for parole.
The Department of Correctional Services reported on Friday that a commission had denied Oscar Pistorius’s request for parole.
A statement claimed that Oscar was ineligible for parole because he had not completed his minimum term. Before being eligible for parole, offenders must serve at least half of their prison term in South African legislation.
However, Oscar’s siblings Carl and Aimee claim that DCS and the parole board have got it all wrong.
On their separate Twitter accounts, they tweeted a statement that read:
“Our family is deeply disappointed by the decision of the Correctional Services and Parole Board on Oscar’s parole consideration.”
It continued: “Per the South African legal system, prisoners are eligible to seek parole once they have served the minimum period and met certain requirements. We believe Oscar has met all these requirements and disagree with how the Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) has evaluated the minimum detention period. We will be seeking clarification”.
The SCA’s judgment and its numerous orders, according to Oscar’s brothers, have caused “continuous confusion and avoidable distress to all parties involved.”
The SCA’s judgment and its numerous orders, according to Oscar’s brothers, have caused “continuous confusion and avoidable distress to all parties involved.”
The statement continued: “Oscar has served over eight years, and six months, under correctional supervision, either in prison or under house arrest, since October 2014. Since re-entering the prison system on 6 July 2016, Oscar has served over six years, and nine months, more than half of his 13-year, and 5-month sentence”.
A second message from Carl detailed the instructions issued by the SCA between January 2021 and March 2023. The parole board, according to the Pistorius family, was a “mistake compounding another mistake.”
The document explains how the SCA recently issued a clarification order antedating Oscar’s murder conviction to November 2017 – the date the court handed down his 13-year and five-month sentence – and not taking into consideration time already served in jail prior to this. The family contends that the start of his prison term truly occurred in July 2016.
“This is simply wrong”, the document concluded.
Oscar Pistorius’ appeal for parole was denied in November 2022, according to Beeld, because of an error in the dates on which his sentence was imposed.
This comes after the difficult murder trial in which the former Paralympian received three distinct verdicts. The Supreme Court of Appeal sentenced Pistorius to 15 years in jail in 2017 for murder. (SCA). This was altered to 13 years and 5 months in prison due to time already spent.
Julian Knight, Pistorius’s attorney, allegedly received two orders from the SCA requesting that the sentence be retroactively applied to the year the offender was initially sentenced. In his application, Pistorius and his lawyer claimed that since they thought he had served half of his prison term, he was qualified to be considered for parole in February 2021.
Atteridgeville Prison, where Pistorius served the bulk of his sentence, asserts that he won’t be eligible until March 2023.
In October 2014, Pistorius was found guilty of culpable murder. In December 2015, this was subsequently upgraded to murder. He received a six-year term to jail. However, after losing an appeal in November 2017, the SCA extended his prison sentence to 13 years and 5 months.
