* Updated
Cape Town - Disgraced Olympic sprinter Oscar Pistorius will be released from prison on August 21 to serve the remainder of his five-year sentence for culpable homicide under correctional supervision, the department of correctional services confirmed on Monday.
“The acting National Commissioner of Correctional Services Mr Zach Modise has confirmed that the Correctional Supervision and Parole Board of Kgosi Mampuru II Correctional Centre, sat on 5 June 2015 and approved the placement of Oscar Pistorius under correctional supervision with effect from 21 August 2015,” said departmental spokesman Manelisi Wolela.
“Under South African law a prisoner can be released on correctional supervision after having served one sixth of his sentence.”
Wolela said the family of Reeva Steenkamp, whom Pistorius shot and killed on Valentine’s Day 2013, attended the hearing that agreed to his release.
“In line with the provisions of both the Criminal Procedure and Correctional Services Acts, the family of the victim was invited and participated in the deliberations of Correctional Supervision and Parole Board.”
“They indicated that they had forgiven him,” Wolela added.
He would not reveal the conditions attached to Pistorius’s probation but said if the disabled athlete contravened these, he would be arrested and returned to prison.
Pistorius was jailed in October last year, and would have served ten months by the time he is released.
The State is appealing his conviction and sentence in November. Prosecutor Gerrie Nel is seeking a murder conviction. He has termed the five-year sentence was “shockingly inappropriate”.
In December last year, at the hearing for leave to appeal, Nel argued that the Pretoria High Court had shown Pistorius too much mercy.
“There can also be an instance where too much mercy is shown to an accused. Based on all the facts, we say that the element of mercy was over-exaggerated.”
ANA