The Department of Correctional Services (DCS) has confirmed that convicted killer Oscar Pistorius has met with the mother and father of Reeva Steenkamp for a victim-offender dialogue.
The division on Friday stated Pistorius was transferred again to the Atteridgeville Correctional Facility following the assembly, which presents “an opportunity for the offender and victims to engage with one another”.
Pistorius had beforehand been moved to the St Albans Correctional Centre in Gqeberha, Eastern Cape, for the victim-offender dialogue in November 2021.
“DCS can now affirm that the victim-offender dialogue course of has been fulfilled.
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“There is a need to emphasise that inmates are required to partake in the victim-offender dialogue as part of their rehabilitation path wherein they are able to acknowledge the harm they have caused to their victims and the society at large,” the division’s spokesperson Singabakho Nxumalo stated in a press release.
Nxumalo, nonetheless, identified that taking part within the victim-offender dialogue didn’t “equate to the end of a sentence or a parole placement”.
Therefore, Pistorius will proceed serving his sentence in jail.
According to government, “the offender, out of his own free will, asks for forgiveness, but the victim has no obligation to accept the apology”.
Culpable murder to homicide
In an interview with The Times in April, Pistorius’ lawyer, Julian Knight, accused June and Barry Steenkamp of a “deliberate attempt to punish him and frustrate” his parole course of.
Knight advised the UK newspaper that Pistorius had been met with “one delay after another“, adding that his client had a “squeaky clean prison record and meets all the requirements for parole”.
Pistorius was initially sentenced to 6 years behind bars for culpable murder in 2016 after he was convicted of capturing and killing Steenkamp by means of the door of a locked rest room cubicle inside the previous athlete’s dwelling in Silverlakes, east of Pretoria.
READ MORE: ‘Pistorius not yet eligible for parole’ say Reeva’s mother and father
Later, the cost was modified to homicide and a further 13 years was added to his sentence, following an attraction by the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) for an extended jail sentence.
The former athlete was initially solely set to be eligible for parole in March 2023, but the Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) did not account for “time served” when Pistorius’ cost was upgraded from culpable murder to homicide in 2017.
The SCA didn’t think about that Pistorius had already served greater than 500 days behind bars.
Flabba’s killer parole
In May, Sindisiwe Precious Manqele, who was convicted for the homicide of her boyfriend Nkululeko “Flabba” Habedi, was launched on parole.
Manqele was granted parole by way of Section 73 of the Correctional Services Act, “which determines the minimum period of sentence that must be served before consideration may be granted for possible placement”.
She is obligated to adjust to particular set of circumstances and will be subjected to supervision till her sentence expires on 23 May 2028.
Manqele, who additionally partook within the victim-offender dialogue programme earlier than her parole might be granted, was sentenced to 12 years behind bars after stabbing Habedi to demise at his dwelling in Alexandra in September 2015.
Habedi, who was stabbed on the chest, was a Hip-Hop artist who grew to become a family identify together with his Skwatta Kamp group.
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