Transcript: Episode 74, Season 4 - Oscar Pistorius and Reeva Steenkamp – Death in the Dark

Oscar Pistorius, aka, The Blade Runner, is South Africa’s Golden Boy, a handsome and beloved Paralympian champion, seen as a role model and sterling example of grace, strength, and persistence.

Blonde, beautiful Reeva Steenkamp, is a successful model whose star just keeps rising, though she ultimately has her sights set on a legal career so she can be a champion for those in need.

When this glamorous pair meet and fall in love, they seem to be the perfect match – even drawing comparisons to Posh and Becks.

But then, on Valentine’s Day, just three months into their relationship, Oscar brutally kills Reeva.

Everyone knows Oscar did it.

But everyone is stunned as to why he says he did.

Listen to the episode HERE.

Photo caption (L-R): Oscar Pistorius aka, The Blade Runner, is born without fibulas in either leg, leading to double amputations when he was 11 months old. This doesn't hold him back from becoming a world champion athlete (credit: ESPN); Reeva Steenkamp is a rising model in South Africa, starring in numerous commercials and landing prominent TV presenter jobs; she also had her sights set on a legal career (credit: USA Today) Oscar electrified the world when he participated in the 2012 Summer Olympic Games in London (credit: The Independent); Reeva and Oscar the night of their first date, when she accompanied him to the South African Sports Awards (credit: Channel 4); Reeva and Oscar seemed like the perfect match - even being compared to Posh and Becks (credit: CNN); Reeva and Oscar seemed poised for a long life together (credit: CNN); Reeva's last tweet on February 13, 2013, musing about Valentines Day (credit: Twitter); Oscar luxury mansion in a gated community in suburban Pretoria, South Africa (credit: The Mirror); The toilet room where Oscar says he thought an intruder was hiding - according to prosecutors, a terrified Reeva had locked herself in the tiny room following a vicious argument with Oscar (credit: Sky News); A bloody Oscar after he shot Reeva four times through the door of the toilet room (credit: The Citizen); Oscar during his bail hearing (credit: New York Times); Oscar covers his ears at the description of what happened to Reeva after she was shot (credit: ABC News)

Transcript*:

0:05

Oscar Pistorius, AKA The Blade Runner, is South Africa's Golden Boy, a handsome and beloved Paralympian champion, seen as a role model and sterling example of grace, strength and persistence.

Blonde, beautiful Reeva Steenkamp is a successful model whose star just keeps rising, though she ultimately has her sights set on a legal career so she can be a champion for those in need.

0:31

When this glamorous pair meet and fall in love, they seem to be the perfect match, even drawing comparisons to Posh and Beck's.

But then on Valentine's Day, just three months into their relationship, Oscar brutally kills Reeva.

Everyone knows Oscar did it, but everyone is stunned as to why he says he did.

0:52

Hello and welcome to the Dark Side of Love.

I am your host Bianca Sloane, author of suspense novels about the Dark Side of Love.

And this week I'm putting a spotlight on the case I'm calling Death in the Dark.

Born on November 22nd, 1986 into the wealthy Pistorius family in Santa in Johannesburg in South Africa.

1:12

Oscar Leonard Karl Pistorius was the middle child of Hanka and Sheila Pistorius's three children.

The Pistorius family wealth stem from its ownership of H Pistorius and Company, a private South African company based in Pretoria, its claim to fame being the oldest supplier of agricultural lime in Africa.

1:32

The family are Afrikaner with Italian ancestry and they also have ties to Kenya, with Afrikaans being their native language but with fluency in English.

To his parents surprise, Oscar was born with fibular hemomanlia, which is a congenital absence of the fibula or calf bone in both legs.

1:50

After several consultations with surgeons and specialists, some of whom painted the bleak picture that baby Oscar would never walk when he was just 11 months old, his parents made the decision to have his feet amputated.

As Doctor Jerry Burstfeld, who performed the operation, said in 30 for 30 The Life and Trials of Oscar Pistorius quote, you ideally don't want the child to walk on his feet.

2:15

You don't want him to have an image of his feet. You want him to have an image of the stump. And that's how life is.

Mom Sheila was determined for her son to have a normal life, and he was never treated as though he had a disability.

He was allowed to climb trees, muck around in the mud, swim and do all the things that other little boys his age did.

2:37

Dad Hanka, in his own way, also didn't allow for any self pity or special treatment of any kind, as Oscar's older brother Carl said in the program quote, My dad was quite tough. There's no such thing as I can't. There was very little tolerance for being weak.

2:55

Oscar was six years old when his parents split, leaving mom Sheila as a single mother and, according to what her friend Pat Duchesne said in 30 for 30. While the Pistorius family treated her well, at one point, they wound up buying her a house and even arranged for Oscar and his brother Carl to attend Pretoria Boys High School, which is a public boarding school.

3:17

But Oscar's father was not someone that Sheila could count on for financial support for her or the three kids, and that her life became a constant worry about how she was going to keep a roof over their heads and keep everyone fed.

This constant worry triggered massive anxiety in Sheila when her husband first left.

3:34

The family moved from their plush, spacious home in an upscale neighborhood to a smaller home in a decidedly lower-class neighborhood than the one they had been used to.

As a result, Sheila obsessed about crime and home invasions, which were a common occurrence in South Africa, and she was terrified of someone breaking into the house.

3:53

And to counteract the sphere, she slept with a loaded pistol underneath her pillow, a habit that Oscar would acquire as an adult.

She also sought solace in alcohol, which would eventually lead to issues with her liver.

When Oscar was 15, his mother, who he has noted was a major influence on his life, died in 2002 at the age of 43 after being incorrectly diagnosed with hepatitis and subsequently having an adverse reaction to the medication that she was given to treat it.

4:23

Oscar would later have his mother's date of birth and death tattooed on his arm in tribute to her.

Despite the loss of his feet, Oscar would go on to excel at athletics. As a student at both Constantia Kluf Primary School and Pretoria Boys High School, he played a wide variety of sports, including rugby, water polo, tennis and a Olympic level wrestling.

4:47

Oscar was so serious and so dedicated to being a top athlete.

Jenny Brooks, the guy who owned the gym where Oscar worked out doing things like boxing press ups, I guess that's like pull ups or push ups maybe. He told the BBC that it was six months before he realized that Oscar didn't have any legs commenting that quote, “He was just one of the bunch doing everything at the same pace as everyone else.”

Oscar would later tell the Daily Telegraph quote, you're not disabled by the disabilities you have, you are able by the abilities you have.

According to the BBC, Oscar was known to be confident and charismatic, a warm, affable person giving up his time and as Dateline noted, quote a man of apparently flawless character.

5:33

Oscar's friend Dale Levin told the BBC that Oscar was a legitimately sincere person, saying quote, Typically when you meet someone on the social scene, they're very cold and standoffish, and particularly if you are the spouse of someone famous. But he was someone who embraced me from the beginning.

5:51

He would see me and run over and say hey and talk and we would catch up and see how things were. He was definitely not just faking it, but genuinely interested in you.

However, there was another side to Oscar that not a lot of people saw, as his classmate from Pretoria Boys High School, Craig Muller told 30 for 30.

6:10

While it's true that for the most part, Oscar was an authentic and gregarious guy, Craig says he also caught a glimpse of someone who was, quote, hard, cocky, potentially arrogant.

In 2003 Oscar suffered a serious knee injury while playing rugby which as his former headmaster Bill Schroeder noted in 30 for 30 he probably should have been playing anyway and it was while he was rehabbing his knee from that injury that he began running.

6:36

This was also about the time that he was fitted with the first of his prosthetic racing blades. There was quite a bit of trial and error as he tried to find the right ones, but eventually he did find the right fit and a new passion was born.

After being successfully fitted for those Blade Runner prosthetics, he began competing in T44 events which are single below knee amp amputees.

7:00

So technically Oscar was AT 43, which is a double below knee amputee.

And in fact, just seven months after he received his first pair of running prosthetics, Oscar won the Athens Paralympic 200 meter final, notching a world record time of 21.97.

7:19

He also scored a bronze medal in the 100 meter dash and he would go on to nab a historic silver medal in the 4 by 400 relay and he becomes the first Paralympic athlete to win a World Championship medal. This was following a spate of gold medals.

7:37

Oscar's phenomenal success would spur him to set his sights in on competing in non disabled events and he achieved this goal when he represents South Africa at the 2012 Summer Olympic Games in London, making history again but this time by becoming the first amputee to compete at the games when he runs in the 400 meter race and also as a member of the four by 400 relay team.

8:01

Oscar becomes a media darling on the back of his participation in the Olympic Games, landing on the covers of magazines and newspapers around the globe.

Endless video of him dashing down the track on his prosthetics play on a loop across TV screens, computers and phones, and he is lauded as South Africa's Golden Boy.

8:20

A handsome and resilient champion, he is eventually dubbed the fastest man with no legs and even earns the nickname Blade Runner, a nod to the classic 1982 sci-fi flick starring Harrison Ford.

And while Oscar was having tremendous success as an athlete, romance was a challenge that he had a hard time conquering.

8:40

As the BBC noted, Oscar admitted to having, quote, turbulent relationships with women over the years, writing in his memoir that he was prone to quote nasty arguments and fiery entanglements with girlfriends.

His former girlfriend, Samantha Taylor, echoed this to 48 Hours, sharing that in the beginning of their relationship, Oscar was, quote, charming and respectful, but that at about 3 months in, things took a turn noting that, quote, his temper concerned me.

9:08

She described an incident where Oscar had been drinking. And after he fell over, he became convinced that Samantha had beat him up. And she says that because of that belief, he unleashed a torrent of vitriol, torture, calling her all kinds of names, all kinds of accusatory things.

9:24

And Samantha says that throughout their relationship, this was very common, calling him, quote, verbally abusive, emotionally abusive, very controlling.

She said that she wasn't even allowed to wear high heels.

Oscar had broken up with Samantha before the Olympics because he was saying to her that the games came first.

9:44

He had to devote all his time to that though. Once the games were over, they found themselves drawn back together. Though they finally did break up for good in late 2012.

Gianni Merlot, Oscar's co-author for his memoir Blade Runner, released in 2009, told the BBC that Oscar quote could get very furious.

10:01

Suddenly he spoke of a fire inside. He had tough arguments with girls and afterwards sweet reconciliation. He always had very beautiful girlfriends. I never saw the temper, but sometimes there were situations where it was apparent. Sometimes he can explode. And I have always seen the bright part of the moon. I've never seen the dark part.

In 2012, Oscar began a romance with a woman who had her own measure of celebrity and therefore was able to take his fame in stride, which seemingly made for a perfect match.

10:33

And her name is Reeva Steenkamp.

Reeva Rebecca Steenkamp was born on August 19th, 1983 in Cape Town to horse trainer Barry and his second wife June.

She had two older half siblings from her parents previous marriages.

10:49

Sister Simone and brother Adam Steenkamp's moved to the bustling seaport of Port Elizabeth, where Reeva attended St. Dominic's Priori School.

Tall, willowy blonde, Reeva had started modeling at the age of 14, eventually becoming the face of Avon in South Africa, modeling for Savannah Diamonds and gracing the pages of FHM magazine, among many others.

11:13

As the BBC reported, Kim Martin, Reeva's cousin, said that Reeva was meticulous and hardworking and that, quote, family was everything to her.

In fact, her family was the whole reason that Reeva even got into modeling because at one point they had run into some financial difficulties and modeling was a way to help the family pay for her education.

11:33

Reeva would eventually parlay her modeling success into a career as ATV presenter, becoming a roaming correspondent for Fashion TV in South Africa and starring in commercials for a wide variety of brands including Aldor, Pin Pop, Toyota Reds, which is a beer, and Clover, which is a dairy company.

11:51

She was even a celebrity contestant on the BBC lifestyle show Baking Made Easy.

Despite her burgeoning career in entertainment, Rita had aspirations of a legal career.

She had enrolled at the University of Port Elizabeth where she studied law, later graduating with a Bachelor of Laws degree in 2005.

12:10

She worked as a paralegal and had set a goal of being a qualified legal advocate by the time she turned 30.

So besides being smart, successful, ambitious and beautiful, Reeva is also a really nice person.

Her BFF and roommate Gina Myers shared with the BBC that Reeva was quote as magnificent on the inside as she was beautiful on the outside.

12:34

In October of 2012, Reeva began dating Springbok rugby player Francois Hugard.

However, not long after connecting with Francois, Reeva met Oscar in November of 2012 through a mutual friend at an event.

Turns out, Oscar had to attend the ceremony for the South African Sports Awards that night and was in need of a date, and Reeva agreed to go with him.

12:56

The pair hit it off and although Reeva continued to be off and on for just a little bit with Francois, it quickly became clear that she and Oscar were falling in love.

Something that likely bonded the two were that growing up, Reeva had been an avid horseback rider, but she broke her back when she was in her early 20s and had to learn to walk again after spending eight months in the hospital.

13:17

Reeva and Oscar were a power couple in South Africa, famous, wealthy, good looking regulars on the social scene.

There were even comparisons to golden couple David and Victoria Beckham or Posh and Beck's as they are sometimes known.

And Reeva was not shy about sharing her feelings about Oscar on her social media pages.

13:36

She would frequently refer to him as her, quote, Boo and as one of her favorite people and how beautiful she thought he was to look at. She sometimes even affectionately called him Ozzy.

And according to what Oscar's family told CNN, Reeva made him happy with his Uncle Arnold telling the outlet, quote, all of us saw firsthand how close she had become to Oscar during that time and how happy they were.

Arnold also said that the pair had big dreams for the future.

February 14th, 2013 Thursday It's Valentine's Day and Reeva and Oscar have been dating for about 3 months.

14:14

This was a day like all young girls in love, that Reeva was happily anticipating.

She had even asked her 30,000 plus Twitter followers the day before quote what have you got up your sleeve for your love tomorrow? Get excited!

Reeva was scheduled to give a speech to a group of girls at Sandown High School later that day called Placing Value on You, in which she planned to encourage the girls to love themselves and not worry about trying to please others.

14:41

According to Oscar, the night of February 13th, he and Reeva went to dinner around 7:00 and he says when they returned to his house, a four bedroom estate in the private Silverwoods Country estate in suburban Pretoria, he watched TV while Reeva did yoga before she and Oscar went to bed.

14:59

Reeva sent one final tweet in response to Candy McKenna of the Santon Mini Cooper dealership regarding a Valentine's Day cupcake meet and greet at the dealership the following day, posting quote I'm there like a bear.

Oscar says that he woke up sometime in the early hours of February 14th and said a few words to Reeva, who was asleep beside him, before he got up to move two oscillating fans that he had on the balcony into the bedroom because the air conditioning wasn't working and that he closed the sliding door and the curtains.

15:31

He then claimed that he heard the bathroom window sliding open and he panicked, believing that an intruder or intruders had come into the bathroom via the window.

Adele Levin, who was friend of both Reeva and Oscar, told the BBC that Oscar had expressed concerns about crime recently, claiming that he had received death threats and had been the victim of violent crime.

15:54

Journalist Karen Mon told Dateline that Oscar had become so paranoid about crime that he, quote, literally walked around with a loaded 9mm with him at all times.

New York Times reporter Michael Sokolove told Dateline that Oscar was known to have problems with insomnia, saying quote, Oscar didn't and sleep well. Oscar didn't sit still.

He was restless all the time. He seemed to have a great deal of fear, reasonable or not, of people breaking into his house.

And remember that Oscar's mom had a persistent fear of intruders and home invasions, and Oscar absorbed her fear as his own.

16:31

Oscar lived in a gated community with security. He also had an extensive alarm system for the house and there were high walls, like high concrete walls at the back.

One of those walls is topped with a 220 Volt wire, which would not be mildly ticklish, like it would pretty much fry you.

16:50

And one of the other walls was like a chain link fence. And on the other side of that fence or wall is Farm Inn, like Farm Farmer, and there are lions and cheetahs in Farm Inn. So all of these measures are meant to deter intruders.

17:08

Like, in other words, you'd have to really be pretty determined to invade somebody's house in this community. Like I said, all of these security measures, it would not be really easy to do.

OK, so the bathroom window in question did not have burglar bars, but Oscar had some work being done at the house and the workers had left a ladder outside of that window.

17:30

And Oscar said he was afraid that was being used to gain entry to the second floor bathroom window.

Oscar says that he was on his stumps, his prosthetics on the floor next to the bed.

He said he was in a panic, someone had broken in and that he felt his and Reeva’s lives were in danger so that he reached under the bed and grabbed the 9mm handgun that he kept there.

17:53

He says that he thought Reeva was still in bed and he told her to to call the police.

He said that he made his way over to the bathroom door, which was closed to investigate.

So the bathroom just to quickly note it's actually like 2 rooms.

Like there's the one big bigger room with like the sink and the bathtub and all that stuff.

18:11

And then there's a toilet room which is for the toilet and it's very small.

It's about the size of a matchbox.

Now, Oscar says that he could see that the bathroom window was open and he wasn't sure if the intruders were outside.

Standing on that ladder that the workers had left behind, he also said that he was too scared to turn on the light.

18:32

Oscar says he had his handgun positioned in front of him and claims that he screamed get out of my house.

He then says that he heard a noise which convinced him that whoever was on the other side of that door was about to come barreling out to attack him and Reeva.

18:48

He said that quote, before I knew it, I had fired four shots at the door.

My ears were ringing.

I couldn't hear anything.

He claims that after firing the four shots, ran back to the bedroom for Reeva and was stunned to realize she was not in bed, and that's when it dawned on him that Reeva must have been in the bathroom and that he shot her.

19:10

Oscar says he ran back to the bathroom screaming for help, and at this point he says that when he tried to open the door, he discovered it was locked.

He ran back to the bedroom, put on his prosthetics, grabbed his cricket bat, something else he kept under the bed for protection, and bashed the bathroom door in with the bat that locked bathroom door or toilet room door.

19:32

A panel on the door broke open and Oscar found the key and then opened it, and that's when he says he saw Reeva slumped against the floor, her head resting on the toilet bowl.

Oscar picked up the barely breathing Reeva from the floor and carried her downstairs.

19:48

A neighbor who was heard the gunshots calls the police.

Oscar then calls his father and asks him to come to the house and he does so, bringing Oscar's sister Emme with him.

Asker tells his sister quote he made a terrible mistake that he had shot Reeva because he believed she was an intruder.

20:06

Paramedics arrived and after several attempts to resuscitate Reeva, who was laying in the foyer, she is pronounced dead.

Reeva Steenkamp was 29 years old.

Oscar is arrested that night for killing Reeva, and his arrest sends a seismic shock through South Africa.

20:23

Oscar was a beloved Golden Boy, an icon, a role model, a hero, and that he would kill someone is inconceivable to South Africans.

Overnight, Oscar became persona non grata in South Africa, where on February 13th, his image had been prominently plastered on billboards around the country.

20:42

The afternoon of the 14th.

Gone.

Torn down like they've never even existed, and the rumors about just what had happened flew fast.

Initial whispers, according to what journalist Barry Bateman said in 30 for 30, was that the girlfriend?

20:58

Generic term the girlfriend, since no one knew who it was that had been killed, had snuck into the house in the middle of the night to surprise Oscar for Valentine's Day. He mistook her for an intruder and he shot her.

Reeva's cousin Kim said in the same program 30 for 30 that when she first heard that theory that it had the ring of truth that it was something that Reeva would do and also remember.

21:20

Because Oscar and Reeva had only been together for a short time, there was speculation that perhaps this was an ex-girlfriend.

However, Reeva's name started trending on Twitter, and her family confirmed that it was Reeva who had been killed by Oscar journalist Karen Mon, notes to Dateline.

21:37

What a quote conflicted narrative the story is. And you really want to believe him.

And in fact, people are desperately clinging to the notion that this was some horrible, tragic accident.

Mary Carrillo, who profiled Oscar as part of NBC's Olympics coverage back in 2012, told Dateline that she herself, quote, exalted him.

21:57

Wanted to believe he was as happy go, lucky and awesome as he appeared to be telling the program quote. I really thought he was a game changer.

The media intensity, the frenzy surrounding this from the beginning. It's global. It is unlike anything that South Africa has ever seen.

22:15

This was probably their OJ frankly, OJ Simpson, a beloved athlete, someone who we all had a very specific very fawning, very positive image of and because of a brutal murder, we come to find out all of his dark horrific secrets.

22:31

The downfall of the Golden Boy electrified the country, leaving everyone in stunt disbelief and it is just breathless minute by minute media coverage again, just like OJ journalist Barry Bateman, He told 30 for 30 that asked the facts that what happened that night and narratives about Oscar's deep seated fears and behavior started to emerge.

22:52

The story about Oscar and who he was began to shift. He noted, quote, everyone has this image of Oscar Pistorius and it is this athlete taking gold at the Paralympics, for example. So you have this image of Oscar Pistorius who was powerful, who has overcome great odds and then we've got this view of this quite pathetic person standing in the dark there weak, sobbing. I think that's when it really they changed the way we viewed this story.

Oscar was released on bail and his trial began on March 3rd, 2014. There is no jury system in South Africa, so the trial is presided over by Judge Thokozile Matilda Masipa.

23:32

There was no disputing that Oscar did this.

The question is why and how?

Because Oscar's version of events does not sit well with authorities.

In fact, it makes less than 0 sense to them.

The prosecutors contended that the killing was premeditated based on the statements of several neighbors who all claimed to have heard an argument between a man and a woman for at least an hour, then a woman screaming, then the gunshots all through the open window of the bedroom balcony.

24:01

Now, remember, Oscar made a point of saying he closed the balcony, the sliding door for the balcony.

Now, one neighbor said about Reeva screams, quote, her shouts. Her screams were petrifying. I knew something terrifying was happening in that house.

24:16

Another neighbor said, quote, she started screaming again. At this point, the intensity and the fear in her voice escalated and it was clear that this person's life was in danger.

So also remember that Oscar said that his ears were ringing after he fired the shots.

24:34

He couldn't hear anything. And the neighbors were saying they heard a woman screaming. So, Oscar is basically saying he did not hear Reeva screaming from inside the toilet room.

Curious.

So prosecutors believe that Oscar and Reeva had a fight that night, that she ran into the bathroom and locked herself inside.

24:51

They claimed that at that point, Oscar put on his prosthetics, grabbed his gun from underneath the bed and ran after Reeva, who was in that toilet room again, which is very small. Anyone who was in there would be trapped.

So, four shots were fired, three of them slamming into Reeva, one in her right hip, which caused her to slump into a wooden magazine holder that was next to the toilet, one in the right arm and one in the head.

25:16

The bullets were black Talon hollow point bullets, which essentially bloom open upon impact and are meant to cause maximum damage to the person on the receiving end, essentially shredding your insides.

Someone shot with this type of bullet is not meant to survive.

25:32

Then there was the bloody cricket bat.

In Oscar's version of events, he used that cricket bat to bash open the locked door, but prosecutors believe that Oscar actually hit Reeva beat her with that bat before he shot her.

Oscar had also said that he carried the still alive, barely breathing Reeva downstairs to do CPR in her, which that also doesn't make a lot of sense because why move her?

25:56

Why not at the very least bring her if that? Because again, that room is pretty small so OK maybe there's that, but why not bring her into the larger bathroom or the bedroom even? Why go through all the rigmarole of carrying her downstairs?

When police investigate the scene, they find 2 cell phones in the bathroom, one on top of the bath mat and the other one partially tucked beneath it.

26:19

It's nonsensical because what half awake person is getting up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom and carrying their phone with them?

And so the presence of these two phones in the bathroom suggests that Reba did indeed lock herself inside the bathroom, perhaps to call for help.

It's also later discovered that on the night of February 13th, Oscar had a long phone call with an ex-girlfriend.

26:39

So did Reba see the evidence of this call on Oscar's phone and confront him, which led to an argument?

There had also been the rumor that Reba's Francois Hugard had texted her, which sparked this potential, this alleged argument, but Francois denies that he'd had any contact with Reeva that night.

26:56

And then there was another of Reeva's exes, Warren Lahood, who she had dated for five years and had come close to marrying.

They'd stayed friends, and they met for coffee on February 12th, 2 days before Reeva was killed.

Did Oscar learn about that meeting and flip out about it? Known as he was to be extremely possessive and jealous.

27:14

Something else that just does not make sense. Among so many things that don't make sense about what happened is that on the floor on the left side of the bed were Reeva's slippers, her overnight bag, and the holster of Oscar's gun.

If he bent down to grab the gun from underneath the bed, how did Oscar not notice that she wasn't in bed in her usual spot?

27:36

Now, the defense says that Oscar and Reeva had switched sides that night.

I'm not sure if I'd buy that because people are pretty possessive of their side of the bed.

OK.

And also, Reeva was not dressed for bed, but rather she was dressed to leave wearing a black top and white shorts, despite the fact that she had texted her friend Gina that she was staying over at Oscar's that night.

27:58

She had her overnight bag there, so she was not planning to leave.

But she may be in an emergency situation right where she might have been afraid for her life, put on her clothes to leave.

But regardless of all of this, how did he not know she wasn't in the bed?

28:16

I think something else that they were trying to say was that whoa is pitch black in the, in the room.

And I'm sorry, even if you have all the lights off, you still see things in a room like it's a, it's virtually impossible for a room to just be pitch, pitch black.

Finally, though, the prosecution said Oscar put on his prosthetics before he shot Reeva, not after, which is what he said, which would suggest premeditation because while he can walk on his stumps, his mobility on them is quite limited, Further bolstering the prosecution's assertion that the murder was premeditated or messages between Reeva and Oscar.

28:51

And one of them, Reeva, flat out said she was scared of Oscar.

In a WhatsApp message sent on January 27th, 2013 from Reeva to Oscar, she says quote, you have picked on me excessively.

I do everything to make you happy and to not say anything to rock the boat

with you.

29:09

You do everything to throw tantrums in front of people.

She went on to say quote, you make me happy 90% of the time and I think we are amazing together.

But I am not some other biotch trying to kill your vibe.

I'm the girl who fell in love with you, but I'm also the girl who gets sidestepped when you were in a shiz mood.

29:29

I get snapped at and told my accent and voices are annoying. I touch your neck to show you I care. You tell me to stop. Stop chewing gum. Do this, don't do that.

You don't want to hear stuff. Cut me off.

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.

29:51

Besides his rocky relationship with Reeva, other revelations that spilled forth were what friends and colleagues termed as a change in Oscar's demeanor as his fame grew.

Oscar in general had been described as someone who was generous, outgoing, charismatic.

However, sports journalist Graham Joffe, who Co owned a racehorse called Tiger Canyon with Oscar and a few others, noted to the BBC that the man he had known for 13 years had become, quote, a different man to the one I had interviewed so many times.

30:21

In the sense that he was a bit standoffish and a little bit cold, old, not his usual warm self.

Graham also described several incidents to the BBC that he termed as, quote, big red flags.

Ones that the outlets observed suggested, quote, an aggressive side and a recklessness that the public didn't see, including when, for example, when Oscar was captaining a boat that was involved in an accident where someone almost died.

30:47

There were sporadic physical and verbal altercations.

And two separate times a gun in Oscar's possession went off, once in a restaurant, the other time through the roof of a car, Graham told the BBC quote I was quite surprised that no one in the media or his management team condemned it publicly.

31:05

He was showing a spoiled brat attitude regarding the incident at the restaurant.

Oscar convinced a friend to take the blame because if it got out, it would cause catastrophic damage to his carefully crafted heroic image.

And because, again, Oscar was this poster child in South Africa.

31:21

Graham suggested to the BBC that this was why the South African media quote didn't explore this unpalatable side of the national hero.

Karen Mahan shared with Dateline that the prosecution contended quote, Everyone keeps making excuses for him and now a woman is dead.

31:38

She went on to say that the prosecution's strategy was to quote, present Oscar Pistorius as a trigger happy cowboy who reached for his firearm in moments of stress.

So there is no hiding any of this at the trial.

And the golden boy's image is irrefutably tarnished.

31:54

I think because nobody asked that what happened that night is that they had a pretty vicious argument and that maybe he takes that cricket bat maybe and that's when he strikes her.

But then somewhere in there at the think I said this before that she gets dressed to leave because he's out of control.

And maybe this is where he pulled out the gun.

I think he chased her into that bathroom with that gun in his hand and she locked herself inside and he was demanding that she come out and when she wouldn't he shot at the door 4 times because he's in a rage.

32:19

He's pissed that she wouldn't obey his orders.

And then he was so shocked from every what everyone has said that he killed her because he was not.

I don't think he was planning to.

I don't think it was premeditated necessarily, but I think it was he was out of control.

Again, my two cents because nobody asked.

32:36

A little over a month after the trial starts, April 7th, 2014, Oscar takes the stand in his own defense and he breaks down in tears during questioning from his attorney and they declare that he is just too emotional to testify.

At one point during the description by a forensics expert about the damage that those exploding bullets did to Reeva’s body, Oscar sobbed before he vomited into a trash can.

32:59

So it was prosecutors actually who asked to have Oscar formally evaluated at a mental health facility for a period of 30 days to determine that he was suffering from any sort of mental challenges at the time of the murder.

Because his defense had said that at the time of the murder he had been suffering from a generalized anxiety disorder.

33:17

Their request was granted and the trial stopped while this evaluation took place.

The trial resumed on June 30th, 2014, and Oscar wasn't found to have any mental health issues when he shot Reeva.

The trial would drag on throughout the summer before a verdict was finally announced by the judge.

33:34

On September 11th, 2014, Oscar was found not guilty of premeditated and 2nd degree murder, but the following day, September 12th, he was found guilty of culpable homicide, which is essentially manslaughter and reckless endangerment for the incident with the gun at the restaurant.

33:51

So it was interesting that they were able to bring that in even though it wasn't part of the murder.

Very interesting.

The judge deemed Oscar's actions as, quote, negligent, but not intentional.

On October 21st, 2014, Oscar was sentenced to five years in prison, which was the maximum sentence for the culpable homicide, with a concurrent 3 year sentence for the reckless endangerment.

34:14

Reeva's parents, Barry and June, were gutted by the verdict in June, told Dateline.

Quote, I wanted the truth. I don't think we've got the truth. That's the whole point. We did not get the truth.

Oscar's defense immediately announced it would appeal in October of 2015, about a year after the verdict and a year into Oscar's sentence, he was released from prison and allowed to live with his uncle.

34:37

And everybody thought that was the end of it.

Not so fast.

So in South Africa, prosecutors can appeal a sentence, and in this case, they did.

And in A twist, on December 15th, 2015, the culpable homicide verdict was overturned by the Supreme Court of Appeal, which instead found Oscar guilty of murder, saying that Oscar should have known darn good and well that firing four shots through a closed door likely would have killed someone, no matter who he thought was on the other side.

35:03

In light of the new verdict, the prosecution asked for 15 years.

But on July 6th, 2016, the judge ultimately sentence Oscar to six years in prison, saying by that point Oscar had already served a year in prison and had demonstrated remorse for what happened.

35:19

Well, another plot twist because in November of 2017, the Supreme Court of Appeal upped the ante and they added nine more years to Oscar's sentence, meaning he was sentenced to 15 years.

Oscar and his team appealed again, but it was dismissed.

35:35

The sentence stood and back to jail he went.

So Oscar was eligible for parole in 2023.

Reeva's mother June, she did not object to him getting parole, not because she felt like he was remorseful, but as she shared with the BBC, she, quote, simply cannot muster the energy to face Pistorius again at this stage.

35:55

In a victim impact statement read to the parole board, June wrote that she had her doubts that Oscar had been rehabilitated, saying quote, rehabilitation requires someone to engage honestly with the full truth of his crime and the consequences, and that she felt he had not dealt honestly with the full truth of his crime.

36:14

Oscar was granted parole on November 23rd, 2023, having served nine years of his 13 year, five month sentence.

The conditions of his parole expire on December 5th, 2029, and those conditions include living at his uncle's Pretoria home.

36:30

It's a mansion, by the way.

Mandatory anger management classes, no alcohol consumption, no media interviews and regular meetings with his parole officer.

In June of 2025, he was given permission to participate in a triathlon in Durban, though his attorney stressed he is not participating in competitive racing.

36:49

Oscar is also reportedly dating family friend, 33 year old Rita Grayling, who with her long blonde hair and tall, slender physique, bears more than a passing resemblance to Reeva.

Reeva's father, Barry passed away on September 14th, 2023 at the age of 80.

37:06

June started the Reeva Rebecca Steenkamp Foundation with a stated mission of helping to alleviate the sense of shame and aloneness experienced by victims, encouraging them to seek help.

Thank you so much for joining me for another episode of The Dark Side of Love.

37:23

I am your host, Bianca Sloane, and show your love for The Dark Side of Love by visiting The Dark Side of love.com for show notes and transcripts.

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37:40

Learn more about my suspense novels about The Dark Side of Love by visiting Bianca sloan.com.

Thanks for hanging out with me and join me next time for another tale of love gone wrong.

I'll see you on the Dark Side.

© 2025 Spotify AB

*provided transcripts are lightly edited.

Sources: