We need your help now
Support from readers like you keeps The Journal open.
You are visiting us because we have something you value. Independent, unbiased news that tells the truth. Advertising revenue goes some way to support our mission, but this year it has not been enough.
If you've seen value in our reporting, please contribute what you can, so we can continue to produce accurate and meaningful journalism. For everyone who needs it.
Sign in. It’s quick, free and it’s up to you.
An account is an optional way to support the work we do. Find out more.
By continuing, you are indicating that you accept our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy.
OSCAR PISTORIUS’S FAMILY have condemned a new book alleging that the amputee Olympic sprinter beat his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp with a cricket bat before he killed her three years ago.
The book claimed to reveal fresh evidence of an argument between the couple — in contrast to Pistorius saying that he mistook Steenkamp for an intruder when he shot her through the door of his bedroom toilet.
Pistorius told his trial that he used the bat to smash open the door after he realised he had shot Steenkamp by mistake at his house in the South African capital Pretoria.
“It is totally absurd to suggest that the State Prosecutor… would have overlooked any evidence that could prove that Oscar used his cricket bat for anything other than bashing open the door,” the family said in a statement.
This is yet another attention-seeking, money making exercise — this time by two citizens with detective fantasies (who) manufacture sensational nonsense theories.
The Pistorius family said it had been forced to deny the allegations after the book received widespread media attention.
Culpable homicide
Pistorius, 29, was first found guilty of culpable homicide — the equivalent of manslaughter — but his conviction was upgraded to murder last year after a state appeal.
Pistorius, who is on bail, appeared in court this week where a judge said his sentencing hearing would be held in June.
The double amputee faces a minimum 15-year jail term for murder, which may be reduced due to time he has already spent in prison.
He denied killing Steenkamp in a rage and, during his trial, sobbed in the dock as details of his lover’s death were examined in excruciating detail.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
Judge wanted to send out a strong message by handing out 3 years, he then went and suspended it, the mind boggles
The mind would boggle in a normal country. Not here, unfortunately
People get beaten up in Ireland every day. Karma works in mysterious ways. What you put out you will get back. Beware.
Money talks. Justice walks.
And he just let them buy themselves out of doing jail time
A suspended sentence is a strong message for a violent and unprovoked attack? What role are these judges living in?
A most generous judge…..3 vicious thugs…
@Peter fechter: Probably from “good families”, pillars of the community, GAA etc
Suspended sentences, a strong message to continue the thuggery with impunity.
A strong message these days is pay €3000 to the victim after you viciously attacked him and the nice judge will give you s suspended sentence. Ridiculous.
Interesting that you can severely beat a victim, risk killing the victim, but you can buy your way our of a custodial sentence.
The moral is that you can hammer people providing you have the money barely to compensate them for their injuries.
Seriously? The final kick in the teeth was delivered by Judge O’Donnell himself. Farce.
I hope the judge wagged his finger at them as he was suspending the sentence, you know, to make a really strong statement!
Tom O’Donnell needs to be investigated. He must have the worst sentence record ever
“I don’t want to be (seen) as allowing these three young men to buy their way out of these matters”
Wtf? That’s exactly what you’ve done judge, how else are people meant to look at it? What a horrible sentence.
Maybe the ‘judge’ should give attempted murderers a chance to throw doubles to avoid jail.
Utterly farcical.
Legal system is a joke
I was assaulted about 2 years ago, and taken to hospital for the night all in blood.
I got no compensation whatsoever.
The attacker committed suicide roughly 1 year after that.
It would seem you’d have to kill someone before you’re jailed in this country
For five years with the last two suspended.
In a situation like that the favour should be returned to each one of them individually. Make sure they don’t lay a finger on anyone else again. Brave boys.
I wonder if these three would get the same sentence if they attacked a judge?
Wonder if these posh thugs came from different part of Limerick, would the judge be so lenient. Class system always wins.
Based on previous sentences handed down by Irish courts, yes.
There are certain types of employment that would dismiss these gentlemen immediately if they were in any such employment…they would also be refused by many employers on the basis of their convictions.
Peter, are you trying to say that the sentences were justified??
Of course not Dave…too much of a believer in personal responsibility for that….my post was simply to point out the long term implications for these 3 buckos if they were of the type to possess a work ethic each.
Sure the legal system is counting on these guys re-offending…more $$$. A major investigation of why we have a legal system and not a justice system needs to take place.
Weak weak judges and no consequences to such cowardly actions is no deterrent. A quick credit union loan and Bob’s your uncle. Just another nail in the Irish coffin. No justice.
Send out a strong message my ass ……no suspended sentence. ..send them to jail for 5 years full term. That would send a stronger message
Why are cases like this never appealed by the DPP as too lenient
Just once DPP appeal a far too lenient sentence
I think someone should explain to this judge how this is as far from a “strong message” as you can get. No wonder the country is going to shite socially with idiots like this as judges.
Let’s them out to do it all again and then get another suspended sentence for them to do it again and then get……….
Deep remorse my hole. FFS the system is beyond a joke.
Well. Judge. You actually let them buy out of it.
I wonder what a weak message would look like, the Judges words and actions don’t match up.
That poor lad deserves justice, he hasn’t got it. 9 grand would probably buy some though, just a thought.
9 grand is not enough. He should have gotten all their worldly possessions that would teach them.
“I don’t want to be seen to be allowing these 3 men to buy their way out of these matters”… so if you could just cough up 9000 euro there now you can go off home. Good man judge.
3 on 1… real tough guys. should all do time, see how they do inside
At least the public know who the assailants are.But this type of verdict does not deter violent thugs or make the law abiding feel secure
A strong message?!!! What a d!psh!te of a judge.
Obviously, the boyfriend of the woman who the victim was talking to doesn’t know what love is.
Three thousand each!?? Probably not even a month’s wage for each of their parents. Ridiculous.
Talk about insecurity? What w….rs.
These judges are a disgrace in this kip, wanted to send out a strong message, and then suspends their sentence, disgusting
Thick judge
Another idiot Judge!! These guys who beat the poor guy are savages!! “They showed great remorse” said their Counsel!!That’s easily said!! The idiot judge bought it!!!!! No real ramifactions for savage perpetrators!! Our Judicial system STINKS TO HIGH HEAVEN!!!
The judge noted “their deep remorse”, yeah right once they were caught! I wonder how many others they beat up before that?
The big problem here is that judges simply don’t have the prison places to stick these ba$tards into and for some mad reason it’s now become the norm that judges think that a cash fine or payout solves everything.
Use precise geolocation data. Actively scan device characteristics for identification. Store and/or access information on a device. Personalised advertising and content, advertising and content measurement, audience research and services development.
These cookies are necessary for the website to function and cannot be switched off in our systems. They are usually only set in response to actions made by you which amount to a request for services, such as setting your privacy preferences, logging in or filling in forms. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not then work.
These cookies may be set through our site by our advertising partners. They may be used by those companies to build a profile of your interests and show you relevant adverts on other sites. They do not store directly personal information, but are based on uniquely identifying your browser and internet device. If you do not allow these cookies, you will experience less targeted advertising.
These cookies enable the website to provide enhanced functionality and personalisation. They may be set by us or by third party providers whose services we have added to our pages. If you do not allow these cookies then these services may not function properly.
These cookies allow us to count visits and traffic sources so we can measure and improve the performance of our site. They help us to know which pages are the most and least popular and see how visitors move around the site. All information these cookies collect is aggregated and therefore anonymous. If you do not allow these cookies we will not be able to monitor our performance.
Cookies, device or similar online identifiers (e.g. login-based identifiers, randomly assigned identifiers, network based identifiers) together with other information (e.g. browser type and information, language, screen size, supported technologies etc.) can be stored or read on your device to recognise it each time it connects to an app or to a website, for one or several of the purposes presented here.
Advertising presented to you on this service can be based on limited data, such as the website or app you are using, your non-precise location, your device type or which content you are (or have been) interacting with (for example, to limit the number of times an ad is presented to you).
Information about your activity on this service (such as forms you submit, content you look at) can be stored and combined with other information about you (for example, information from your previous activity on this service and other websites or apps) or similar users. This is then used to build or improve a profile about you (that might include possible interests and personal aspects). Your profile can be used (also later) to present advertising that appears more relevant based on your possible interests by this and other entities.
Advertising presented to you on this service can be based on your advertising profiles, which can reflect your activity on this service or other websites or apps (like the forms you submit, content you look at), possible interests and personal aspects.
Information about your activity on this service (for instance, forms you submit, non-advertising content you look at) can be stored and combined with other information about you (such as your previous activity on this service or other websites or apps) or similar users. This is then used to build or improve a profile about you (which might for example include possible interests and personal aspects). Your profile can be used (also later) to present content that appears more relevant based on your possible interests, such as by adapting the order in which content is shown to you, so that it is even easier for you to find content that matches your interests.
Content presented to you on this service can be based on your content personalisation profiles, which can reflect your activity on this or other services (for instance, the forms you submit, content you look at), possible interests and personal aspects. This can for example be used to adapt the order in which content is shown to you, so that it is even easier for you to find (non-advertising) content that matches your interests.
Information regarding which advertising is presented to you and how you interact with it can be used to determine how well an advert has worked for you or other users and whether the goals of the advertising were reached. For instance, whether you saw an ad, whether you clicked on it, whether it led you to buy a product or visit a website, etc. This is very helpful to understand the relevance of advertising campaigns.
Information regarding which content is presented to you and how you interact with it can be used to determine whether the (non-advertising) content e.g. reached its intended audience and matched your interests. For instance, whether you read an article, watch a video, listen to a podcast or look at a product description, how long you spent on this service and the web pages you visit etc. This is very helpful to understand the relevance of (non-advertising) content that is shown to you.
Reports can be generated based on the combination of data sets (like user profiles, statistics, market research, analytics data) regarding your interactions and those of other users with advertising or (non-advertising) content to identify common characteristics (for instance, to determine which target audiences are more receptive to an ad campaign or to certain contents).
Information about your activity on this service, such as your interaction with ads or content, can be very helpful to improve products and services and to build new products and services based on user interactions, the type of audience, etc. This specific purpose does not include the development or improvement of user profiles and identifiers.
Content presented to you on this service can be based on limited data, such as the website or app you are using, your non-precise location, your device type, or which content you are (or have been) interacting with (for example, to limit the number of times a video or an article is presented to you).
With your acceptance, your precise location (within a radius of less than 500 metres) may be used in support of the purposes explained in this notice.
With your acceptance, certain characteristics specific to your device might be requested and used to distinguish it from other devices (such as the installed fonts or plugins, the resolution of your screen) in support of the purposes explained in this notice.
Your data can be used to monitor for and prevent unusual and possibly fraudulent activity (for example, regarding advertising, ad clicks by bots), and ensure systems and processes work properly and securely. It can also be used to correct any problems you, the publisher or the advertiser may encounter in the delivery of content and ads and in your interaction with them.
Certain information (like an IP address or device capabilities) is used to ensure the technical compatibility of the content or advertising, and to facilitate the transmission of the content or ad to your device.
Information about your activity on this service may be matched and combined with other information relating to you and originating from various sources (for instance your activity on a separate online service, your use of a loyalty card in-store, or your answers to a survey), in support of the purposes explained in this notice.
In support of the purposes explained in this notice, your device might be considered as likely linked to other devices that belong to you or your household (for instance because you are logged in to the same service on both your phone and your computer, or because you may use the same Internet connection on both devices).
Your device might be distinguished from other devices based on information it automatically sends when accessing the Internet (for instance, the IP address of your Internet connection or the type of browser you are using) in support of the purposes exposed in this notice.
The choices you make regarding the purposes and entities listed in this notice are saved and made available to those entities in the form of digital signals (such as a string of characters). This is necessary in order to enable both this service and those entities to respect such choices.
have your say