Oscar Pisorius will not be found guilty of murdering his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp.
The news was revealed as Judge Thokozila Masipa read her summation of the evidence presented Thursday in front of a packed courthouse in Pretoria, South Africa and a worldwide TV audience.
The judge is yet to deliver her final verdict which is expected later today. Pistorius could still be found guilty of culpable homicide, a conviction that comes with jail time.
But a murder charge is off the table.
The prosecution, Masipa said, “failed to show requisite intention to kill the deceased, let alone premeditation.”
The prosecution have been pushing for murder conviction since the case started but the athlete has always maintained it was a tragic accident.
Masipa called Pistorius a “very poor witness,” saying he was “evasive” in the face of prosecution questioning. Still, in her opinion that did not warrant a guilty verdict on the charge of premeditated murder, or even “dolus eventualis” – the grey area between premeditated murder and culpable homicide.
Under “dolus eventualis,” if Pistorius should have foreseen that his actions could result in death, yet recklessly proceeded anyway, it still would have been considered murder in South African law. That would have come with a minimum sentence of 15 years.
Masipa ruled out a murder conviction based on several key factors:
• Phone records support Pistorius’ timeline of events.
• Pistorius relayed his version of events – that he thought an intruder had entered his home – minutes after the shooting took place, and that his version did not waiver later in questioning. Masipa agreed with the defense that it would be “highly improbable” for Pistorius to have made up this story so quickly.
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