Reeva Steenkamp and Oscar Pistorius - Part 3 of 3

0:00 Hi, I'm Rich and I'm Tina. If there's one thing we've learned in over twenty years of. Marriage, some days you'll feel like killing your husband. And some days you'll feel like killing your wife. Welcome to love, Mary Kill, Hey Tina, Hey Rich, welcome back. Yeah, we're right back where we were a couple of hours ago. It's been a while since we've done a three part episode. We really get to spend a lot of quality time together when we do three part episodes. And some not so quality time. Where's my room shot?

0:44 Yes, it's funny. I don't know if it's out wrong button. Oh there you go. Oh gosh. Three part episodes are grueling for everyone. They are grueling. Yeah, there is a lot to cover here. Well, sometimes when we start art recording an episode, we don't actually know if it's going to be two or three parts, and in this case, I was estimating that it might be two parts, but it really turned out there was a lot to talk about. And so you kind of saved my bacon by creating a snack for this part because I was not prepared with a snack. And look at my face. Was I happy about that? Because you literally told me at the end of episode two, and it's the same day.

1:24 Yeah, so I said I'll do it, and then I didn't. And then I had to break my New Year's resolution because I was like, I was going to make something for dinner, and then I said I wasn't going to do takeout the months of January. It wasn't going to eat sugar. I don't know who I think I am all of a sudden, I have such a dreamer, some resolve. But yeah, so anyway, you were now that I had to make this for you. Now you have to go get me takeout when we're done. Okay, I can do that. While you were making that, I actually took a little nap, so I'm yeah. And I also did launder. But hey, no problem, it's all. It all works out in the end. The woman is over worked and always tired and grumpy and the men wonder why. But anyway, well, I appreciate you.

2:06 Oh that makes it all better. I feel so warm inside. Thank you so much. I appreciate you too, that's sure. Do yep, that's a good thing. I can't recognize, Sarcastle. So you've already shirked on our contract negotiations that we resolved in the previous episode. It is not a frosty beverage here at all. Actually, my water bottle is almost empty and I'm part of. You are. Oh my god, I'm the worst person in the world. I think that today is going to be a solo episode, so see you later. I didn't take all the ice, but there's not a lot. Oh my god, everyone knows there are used tobacle and yeah, it's ridiculous. I was going to say a bad word.

2:49 Well I will just say I did not agree to our contract negotiations. Oh there's a little bit left. I'll go get you some. God, I'll be right back. Okay, this is going to affect the quality of the show. It's going way out. Well, would you like to reveal what you were working so hard to make in the kitchen? Sure, because I didn't want to go to the store because we really didn't have time because we lived two hundred miles away from the nearest thing to the store. I made you South African picnic bread. Oh wow, you actually made something like you worked hard and made something from scratch rather than just I would have just pulled a bag of chips out of the cupboard or something. Well, I wanted to do something South African and I found this recipe and I was like, okay, we have everything that it takes pretty much, and I think it's a pretty interesting recipe. Oh okay, So it's like a bread, but it's very eggy. There's egg, cheese, bacon, and onions in it and you mix it all together. There's very little flour in it. The eggs are what binds it all together.

3:49 Okay, that sounds really good. But I think it's something that would be great for breakfast because there's a lot of eggs, a lot of breads and stuff in it. So if you're a busy person taking the kids to school, you know, I think it's a great thing to grab really quick. But let's try it first. Let's do it. Did you like the picnic bread. I thought it was really good. Yeah, it is very eggy. It's almost like eating an omelet, but like with the sort of bread, you know, binding the omelet together, but a really good flavor like the bacon and cheese and. The onion is a little strong in it. I have to the recipe because it made two loaves and we don't need two loaves of this sitting around but yeah, I thought it was really good other than the egg or not the egg, but the onion was a little strong, yeah, especially spring onions, and we didn't have spring onions, so I just used yellow onion.

4:41 Well, it's pretty amazing that you whipped this up with little mourning. Oh so it's just flattered. Whatever you are. Truly saved your butt once again. And a nice presentation too, with the little clementine on the side and a little strawberry candy too. Well, I'm happy to help. I can tell how about we continue the story of Reva Steincamp and Oscar Pistorius. Good idea. How about a quick recap? In part two, we talked about Oscar and Reva's short relationship just three and a half months before she was killed. We heard a text exchange between the two of them two weeks before her death that showed the cracks in their relationship, and we walked through the night that Oscar shot Riva four times through a door in the bathroom of his house. Oscar claimed he thought it was an intruder, but he was immediately arrested and charged with premeditated murder.

5:36 Public opinion in South Africa was mostly against Oscar. Though many could relate to his extreme fear of crime, he was released on bail and lived comfortably. That's an understatement in his uncle's mansion while awaiting trial. Yeah, I think most of us would pay good money to live in the environment that Oscar was living in during that time. Sounded like a very nice house. Yeah. Anything else that that was a very brief recap. Anything else that jumps out at you that we should mention before we get into part three. Between parts two and three, you sent me a bunch of pictures to post and Riva was just a beautiful just stumming. Yeah, she was studying. Unlike the United States, South Africa does not use juries in criminal trials. The jury system was abolished in nineteen sixty nine during apartheid after the government acknowledged an uncomfortable truth an all white jury could not be trusted to fairly judge black defendants. Even after apartheid ended, juries were never reinstated. With eleven official languages and a population made up of many races, religions, and cultures, South Africa chose a different path, placing decisions of guilt or innocence in the hands of highly trained judges. Rather than attempting to assemble juries that could never truly be free of bias.

6:54 That meant the judge assigned to Oscar Pistorius's case would wield extraordinary power. One person alone would decide his guilt or innocence on each of the charges he faced. Both the prosecution and the defense waited anxiously to see who that would be. The case was assigned to Thoka Zella Masipa. Her background was remarkable. Born just a year before apartheid laws were formally codified by the ruling National Party, Oka Zella, known as Tilly in her youth, grew up in a society designed to limit opportunities for black South Africans, and especially for black women. She was the first of ten children, raised in a two room house in Soweto. Five of her siblings died in childhood. For thirteen years, she slept on the floor beneath the family's kitchen table, the girls confined to one room, the boys to the other, until she earned a chance to attend boarding school in nineteen seventy four, at age twenty four. She finished college with a degree in social work, focusing on women in the townships who were navigating poverty, abuse and domestic violence. In nineteen seventy six, at the height of the Sowetto uprisings, she became a journalist for the World Newspaper, a black publication critical of the apartheid regime. During that period, she was arrested while protesting government efforts to suppress the press.

8:18 While imprisoned, Massipa and other women journalists refused orders to clean toilets, asserting their status as political prisoners. They also refused to enter please in court, rejecting the legitimacy of the apartheid government altogether. She later became women's page editor at the Post, the first black woman to ever hold that role. While working as a journalist and raising a family, Messipa studied law part time, a journey that took her ten years. She earned her law degree in nineteen ninety, the same year Nelson Mandela was released from prison. After seven years practicing law, she was appointed to the bench in nineteen ninety eight, becoming only the second black woman ever knew aimed a High Court judge in South Africa.

9:02 Even years later, she remained part of a small minority. By the time of the Pistorius trial, just seventy six of the country's two hundred and thirty nine judges were women. On the bench, Masipa had a formidable reputation. She was widely described as a tough cookie, direct, unsentimental, and impatient with nonsense. She was also known for being particularly hard on men who victimized women. To many observers, her appointment to Oscar Pistorius's case felt symbolic, almost poetic. A dignified black woman who had once slept on the floor of a sowetto shack was now tasked with deciding the fate of a wealthy, world famous white athlete. For a country still reckoning with its past, the symmetry was impossible to ignore.

9:48 In the weeks leading up to trial, prosecutors added three additional charges to Oscar Pistorius's indictment. All were violations of South Africa's Firearms Control Act, and none were directly related to the shooting of Riva Steam Camp. The first charge stemmed from an incident in which Oscar allegedly fired his pistol through the open sun roof of a moving car while driving with two friends, one of them his then girlfriend, Samantha Taylor. The second involved the negligent discharge of a firearm inside a crowded restaurant, the episode that had narrowly avoided serious injury that we talked about in part two. He made his friend take the huge for that. Yeah, exactly. The third charge alleged that at the time of Reva's death, Oscar was in possession of several rounds of ammunition for which he did not hold a valid license.

10:38 Taken together, the purpose of these charges was clear. Prosecutors were attempting to establish a pattern an ongoing disregard for firearm safety. So these charges, it's odd that they were added to his murder indictment because they really weren't related at all to that. I think the prosecution just they just wanted to make the case that this was a who was careless and reckless. Oscar's legal team was deeply concerned. Privately, his lawyers urged him to plead guilty to at least one of the weapons charges. Doing so, they believed, would demonstrate accountability and remorse. It would allow Oscar to appear candid and cooperative, qualities that might lend credibility to his claim that Riva's death had been a tragic accident. But Oscar refused. He insisted the sun roof shooting never happened.

11:29 He maintained that the restaurant discharge was a freak accident, and he claimed the unlicensed ammunition found in his home belonged to his father, Henke Pistorius, who did have a license for it. Oscar would not concede a single point. He entered pleas of not guilty on all charges. On February fourteenth, twenty fourteen, the one year anniversary of Riva's death, and just two weeks before the start of his trial, Oscar released a public statement, No words can adequately capture my feelings about the devas stating accident that has caused such heartache for everyone who truly loved and continues to love Reva. The pain and sadness, especially for Riva's parents, family and friends, consumes me with sorrow. The loss of Reva and the complete trauma of that day I will carry with me for the rest of my life. It was the last time Oscar Pistorius would speak publicly before the trial began. Oscar's in a really weird position here because he admitted that he shot her, but he also has to try to make the case that it was an accident, so he wants to come across as very apologetic, but at the same time, he can't really admit anything beyond it being a tragic accident. From that point forward, the story would no longer be shaped by statements or speculation, but by sworn testimony, cross examination, and evidence laid bare in open court.

12:54 The trial of Oscar Pistorius began on March third, twenty fourteen, just over a year after Reva's death. Outside the courthouse, crowds gathered in protest and anticipation inside the courtroom was packed. In an historic decision, Judge Messepa ruled that the trial could be televised live, the first time a criminal trial in South African history would be broadcast in real time. There were limits, though witnesses could choose not to appear on camera. The public appetite was enormous. A new pay TV channel was launched to carry the proceedings around the clock. It quickly became known as the Oscar Channel. But the outcome of the trial would not be a simple question of guilty or not guilty. Judge Messepa had several legal options when it came to Reva's death. An outright acquittal was technically possible, but few believed it was realistic. Oscar had admitted firing the shots that killed Reva. At the top end was murder with premeditation. To secure that conviction, prosecutors would have to prove that Oscar had formed a conscious plan to kill Reva before pulling the trigger. A conviction carried a mandatory minimum sentence of twenty five years in prison. This was the charge the state was pushing hardest for. At the other extreme was culpable homicide, roughly equivalent to manslaughter in the United States. This would mean that the court found the killing to be negligent rather than intentional. The sentencing range here was broad, anything from

14:28 a suspended sentence or a community service to a maximum of fifteen years in prison. This was the best case outcome Oscar's defense team was hoping for. Between those two was the most debated charge, murder without premeditation, known in South Africa law as dolus e ventualis. Under Dolus eventualis, the prosecution would not need to prove that Oscar specifically intended to kill Reva. They would only need to show that he fired his weapon knowing there was a real possibility that whoever was behind the door would die, and that he proceeded anyway. In other words, the question was not who he believed he was shooting at, but whether he subjectively foresaw that firing four shots into a small, enclosed space would likely be fatal. A conviction on Dolus eventualis required a prison sentence, but still allowed the judge considerable discretion in determining its length. Most South African legal analysts believed this middle ground murder without premeditation was the most likely outcome. As the cameras rolled and the testimony began, the trial would hinge on a single, deceptively simple question, what did Oscar Pistorius believe in those seconds before he pulled the trigger. The state's best chance of proving murder with conscious premeditation rested on the closest thing it had to eyewitnesses, neighbors who said they were awakened that night by gunshots and screaming. The prosecution's goal was straightforward. If

15:58 witnesses could establish that there was arguing, raised voices, yelling, or distress before the shots were fired, it would directly contradict Oscar's claim that he fired in panic, believing an intruder was hiding in the bathroom. Four neighbors were called to testify. Michelle Berger and her husband Charles Johnson, who lived roughly two hundred yards away, separated by a high wall in a neighboring estate, Astelle Vandermere, who lived about one hundred yards away, Johann Stip and his wife Annette Stip, who lived approximately seventy five yards from Oscar's house. The problem for the prosecution was that the testimony did not line up. Michelle Berger testified that she woke around three am to what she described as terrible screams from a woman.

16:43 She said she then heard a man crying for help, followed by more screams from the woman. After that, she heard a single gunshot, a pause, and then three more gunshots in quick succession. Between these shots, she said she heard one final scream from the woman, then silence. So Michelle lives the furthest away from these other witnesses. It's quite a ways a way too, if you think about two hundred yards and separated by a high wall between her house and Oscar's house. I remember you said that Oscar slept with fans because he didn't like the air conditioning. Were the windows open well. The fans were in like a sliding doorwall, and that was open until he moved the fans and closed the door wall.

17:28 Her husband, Charles Johnson, largely corroborated her account. In fact, Oscar's defense team suggested your testimony was too similar, implying that they may have rehearsed it together. Johnson also testified that he called the estate's security company at three sixteen am, immediately after hearing the shots. That detail became critical because Oscar's first confirmed phone call wasn't made until three nineteen am. The defense argued that the timeline simply didn't work. In three minute, They said Oscar was moving on his stumps, could not have fired the shots, retrieved his prosthetic legs, broken down the bathroom door with a cricket bat, and then placed his first call. Stel Vandermir's testimony introduced more uncertainty.

18:15 She said she woke up shortly before two a m. More than an hour before the shooting, to the sound of fighting in a nearby house, but she couldn't identify the voices, the language being spoken, or even which house the sounds were coming from. She later heard four gunshots around three a m. But, unlike Berger and Johnson, she did not hear any pause between them after the shots. Vandermere testified that there was a period of silence followed by loud crying. She believed it was a woman's voice. The defense seized on that point there was no way Reva could have been screaming after the shots. They argued Oscar's own sobbing, high pitched, frantic, and desperate, had likely been mistaken for a woman's cries. Doctor Johann Stipp and his wife, who were the closest to the house, offered yet another version. Both testified they were awakened by three loud bangs they believed were gunshots. Only after that did they hear screaming, which they initially thought sounded like a woman.

19:16 Stip looked out his window, saw lights on in Oscar's home and observed a figure moving inside. He tried calling a state security but got a busy signal, then phoned the police. While still on the call, he heard two or three more rapid, louder bangs stepping onto his balcony. He then heard a man shouting repeatedly, help, help, Help. As the testimony unfolded, and his phone records were mapped against it. Several things became clear. One, Oscar's anguish cries after discovering Riva had been shot were high pitched and easily mistaken for a woman's screams. Two, some witnesses likely confused the sound of gunshots with the noise of Oscar smashing down the bathroom door using a cricket bat. And three, no witness could definitively place an argument or shouting before the shots were fired. Perhaps most damaging to the prosecution was who didn't testify. The state chose not to call three additional neighbors, black residents who actually lived closer to Oscar's home than any of the witnesses they presented. One of them had a balcony just thirty six feet away from Oscar's home. When it was the defense's turn, those neighbors were called, their accounts aligned far more closely with Oscar's version of events. Gunshots followed quickly by high pitched wailing, frantic please, and desperate cries of help, help, help, and please, please please. Instead of proving premeditation, the states eye witnessed testimony had done something else. Entirely. It introduced doubt, and

20:47 in a case that would turn on what oscar pistory is believed, in a matter of seconds, doubt mattered. So this testimony from the neighbors is interesting because, as we talk about a lot, eyewitness testimony is not always is that reliable. Right, it's the least reliable testimony. Yeah, they do, and a lot of their testimony conflicted with each other about different aspects of it. There was a lot of detail I didn't really get into here because it got it got kind of hard to follow in a lot of ways. But the one thing was that the phone calls that were made at different times, like some of the neighbors made phone calls, those were verifiable that Okay, this call happened at this exact time, and it. Was interesting that the phone was busy when you knew one of the other neighbors must have been calling too.

21:31 Yeah, that too, And so there were there were things that they could really discover from those phone calls, and it just it didn't match up with the fact that there was an argument before the gunshots. There was nothing that could really show that there truly was an argument before. Ok that makes a difference, it does. We'll be back after a break. One of the most anti dissipated witnesses for the prosecution was Samantha Taylor, Oscar's former girlfriend. On paper, Samantha was there to testify about one of the firearms charges, specifically the allegation that Oscar had fired a gun through the open sun roof of a moving car while she was present, but in reality her testimony served a broader purpose. The state was using her to introduce character evidence that might support the murder charge itself. On the stand, Samantha described a relationship that she said was volatile and emotionally exhausting. Her account stood in sharp contrast to Oscar's carefully cultivated public image as a polite, soft spoken, nice guy. She testified that while Oscar could be affectionate and generous, his mood could shift suddenly.

22:46 Minor issues, she said, could trigger explosive anger when they were apart. Samantha told the court Oscar demanded constant reassurance. He would insist she'd tell him where she was and what she was doing, and often required photographic proof to verify her location. She said he shouted abusive language at her. Reactions she described as wildly disproportionate to whatever had prompted them. Taken together, her testimony painted a picture of a man who struggled with control, jealousy, and emotional regulation, traits the prosecution argued were relevant to what happened on the night Reva Stemcamp was killed. Oscar's defense team moved quickly to undermine her credibility. They framed Samantha as a bitter ex girlfriend motivated by resentment and jealousy. Angry, they suggested that Oscar had moved on with Riva. Her testimony, they argued, was not objective recollection, but emotional retaliation. The court was left to decide which version of Samantha Taylor to believe, a truthful witness describing a troubling pattern of behavior, or a spurned former partner with an axe to grind, and once again, the case came down to interpretation. About a month into the trial, the defense made a decision they had been dreading. They called Oscar Pastorius to the stand.

24:04 His lawyers were deeply conflicted. They feared that Oscar would crumble under sustained cross examination, especially from the state's notoriously aggressive prosecutor, but they also felt they had no real alternative. If Oscar did not testify, it would signal a lack of confidence in his own explanation that he had genuinely mistaken Riva for an intruder. Oscar began his testimony by reading a prepared apology addressed to Riva's. Family, Monday's peace. Start offer my evidence by tindering an apology. So apologize to to Friendsman.

24:50 I don't like doing this too, but I can hardly hear. I figure, Pardie, I'll speaker. Then. There hasn't been a moment. Since this tragedy happened that I haven't thoughts about your family. I wake up every morning. You the first people I think of, the first people I pray for. I can't imagine the pain and the sorrow and intimous love course to you and your family. I was simply trying to Protectreava. I can promise that when she went to bid that night, she felt loved. I've tried to put my words on paper many many times, tough out to you, but no words to they were suffice.

25:33 In here. He can barely hold it together. I didn't really talk about it much in my script, but in this trial he was a mess, like he was constantly breaking down, crying, he was throwing up. They had to put a wastebasket near him because he would get sick. And he was just he was just an emotional mess. The day after he made that statement in court, June Steencamp told the Daily Mirror, it left me unmoved. I knew it was coming. My lawyers had prepared me for it. I cried for the first time. Yes, but not because he apologized. I cried because of the suffering and agony that my darling daughter went through, and because I will never have her again. As Oscar's testimony continued, he largely repeated the same version of events he had given at his bail hearing, but there were a few notable editions.

26:20 He testified that when he got out of bed to move the fans on the balcony, Reva briefly spoke to him, saying, can't you sleep, my baba. He replied, no, I can't. Oscar said that brief exchange reinforced his belief that Riva was still in the bedroom when he later heard a noise down the hall. It's interesting that he left that out of his initial affidavit. You would think that would be a pretty important thing that I know, actually exchanged words with her, and that's why I thought she was still in bed. Good point. He also emphasized his vulnerability. When he heard movement in the toilet cubicle, he said he believed the person inside was about to come out. He was standing on his stumps, unable to run or physically defend himself. He said he fired his gun in fear. So that was another thing he said is that when he was outside the bathroom door, he heard a noise come from inside that toilet cubicle.

27:13 It was later speculated that I think there was a magazine stand in there that Reva might have moved that or slid it or something like that, and that's what he heard. It had just triggered this reaction where he fired the gun at that point. Don't you think she would have said, like, Oscar's me, it's Reva. That I think is one of the big questions in this case of whether she would have said something or not the. Defense or did he say something? Well, he was. Yelling, right, he was apparently, you know, according to his story, he was going down the hall yelling, get the fuck out of my house, you know, thinking it was an intruder. What the defense speculated on the point of why didn't Reva say something is that she was in the room, in the toilet room, and she heard him yelling, and so maybe she assumed there was an intruder in the and so she didn't say anything because she didn't want to reveal where she was.

28:04 That's why he was in the bathroom yelling. He was coming down the hall yelling as he came toward the bathroom. So it wasn't an on Sweet bathroom. So I'll post a picture of a layout that we that we found, but it may have been an on Sweet bathroom. But if it was, it was kind of He still had to walk down a hall from the bedroom to get to the bathroom, like it was sort of attached, but it was down a ways down the hall. So I guess like our bathroom, like we have like a little I guess you would maybe call it like a lot. Yeah, it was all away or a crevice, right, yeah, Okay. As Oscar reached the end of his account, he broke down completely. He sobbed uncontrollably in the witness box. Judge Massipa adjourned court for the day. Then came cross examination when prosecutor Jerry Nell finally rose, he wasted no time.

28:55 You killed her. Nell said, you shot and killed her. Won't you take responsibility for that? Without warning, Nell displayed a graphic photograph of Reva's face, bloodied with visible bone and brain tissue, and demanded Oscar look at it and accept responsibility. Oscar refused, saying the image was already seared into his mind and haunted him daily. The cross examination lasted five days. Nell accused Oscar of fabricating his version of events to fit the evidence. In his closing barrage, he told Oscar, your version is so improbable that it cannot possibly be reasonably true. The truth is, you shot four shots through that door while knowing that she was standing there. You knew she was talking to you. You armed yourself for the sole purpose of shooting and killing her, and that's what you did. Reactions to Nell's approach were mixed.

29:45 Some felt he had crossed the line that his tactics were overly aggressive, but most legal observers agreed on one thing. He had the upper hand. Oscar spoke too much. He appeared agitated and confused. At times, he contradicted himself, struggled under pressure, and often seemed evasive. Still, even after five grueling days of cross examination, one reality remained, proving murder with conscious premeditation, the most serious charge was still going to be an uphill battle. A central pillar of Oscar's defense was psychological. His legal team argued that what had happened in the early hours of February fourteenth could not be understood purely through ballistics or timelines. To them, Oscar's actions only made sense when viewed through the lens of his fears, insecurities, and psychological makeup.

30:37 Factors they'd believed explained why he reacted so disproportionately to a noise in the bathroom. To support that argument, the defense had Oscar evaluated by a highly respected professor of psychiatry, who later testified in court. She told the judge that the amputation of Oscar's legs at just eleven months old would have been profoundly traumatic, even if he was too young to consciously remember it. His parents, she explained, had made a deliberate choice never to allow him to see himself as abnormal. In many ways, that decision served him well. It helped him achieve extraordinary things, but it also came at a cost. According to the psychiatrist, Oscar grew up feeling compelled to appear normal at all times, despite knowing that he was different. That tension between who he was publicly and how he felt privately created a chronic state of anxiety and stress. He lived what she described as a dual existence. I guess if you put all of that on top of like this fame that he got because he was this special athlete, that would confuse things even more. On one side was the public Oscar, the golden boy, the elite athlete, the man with sponsorships, fast cars, and beautiful girlfriends. On the other was a deeply insecure individual, painfully self conscious, terrified of being pitied or ridiculed, and emotionally immature in ways that conflicted sharply with his outward success.

32:07 Unable to reconcile those competing identities, she said, Oscar lived in a near constant state of psychological strain. His public persona polite, gracious, admired, masked someone who was socially uncomfortable and profoundly lonely. The relentless travel required by his athletic career only intensified that isolation, making it harder for him to form stable, emotionally secure relationships. She diagnosed Oscar with generalized anxiety disorder, a condition that can cause people to perceived threats where none exist. In her view, Oscar was hyper vigilant, constantly scanning for danger, primed to react.

32:50 One of the interesting things about this defense that they were putting on is that Oscar is very clearly, very insecure and very anxious about a lot of things. And that was the core of the defense, which was going to be broadcast live to hundreds of thousands of millions of people. And so Oscar was put in this position where his best defense was basically putting all these vulnerabilities and insecurities on display to the entire world, which must have been really difficult for him to agree to. That's the case in a lot of trials, though, to become vindicated, you have to present your most vulnerable self. True. Following the psychiatrist's testimony, the prosecution pushed back. They demanded that Oscar go independent psychiatric evaluation by state appointed experts.

33:39 Judge Messiba agreed, and the trial was paused well. Oscar spent a month under observation, evaluated by three psychiatrists and one psychologist. The conclusions were more nuanced. They acknowledged that Oscar displayed symptoms of generalized anxiety disorder, but said those symptoms were not clinically significant at the time of the shooting. However, they diagnosed him with clinical depression and post traumatic stress disorder, along with an acute fear of humiliation and ridicule. Importantly for the defense, the experts found no evidence that Oscar exhibited traits of narcissism or psychopathy, personality characteristics often associated with rage driven intimate partner killings. The results were mixed, but overall, the psychiatric evidence appeared to bolster the defense's narrative more than the prosecutions. Oscar emerged not as a calculated killer, but as a deeply anxious, emotionally fragile man who reacted catastrophically under perceived threat. The defense formally rested its case on July eighth. So how long when did the trial start?

34:48 It started in March. Oh, oh, my gosh. I mean there was a long break where he had he went through the psychological evaluation. But yes, it was a very long trial. A month later, both sides delivered their closing arguments. Judge Messipa, then a announced she would deliver her verdict on September eleventh, more than six months after the trial began. By that point, the evidence had been heard, the testimony weighed, and the country was waiting not just for a verdict, but for an answer to what Oscar Pistorius truly believed in those final irreversible seconds. Just days after the defense rested, Oscar drew fresh attention for all the wrong reasons. On July twelfth, Oscar went out to a nightclub in an affluent suburb of Johannesburg with his cousin. According to multiple reports, he had been drinking heavily and became aggressive. An altercation broke out between Oscar and a South African race car driver, forcing bouncers to step in and ask Oscar to leave the club. The timing could not have been worse. The following day, Oscar's family released a public statement attempting to contextualize his behavior. Quote, Whilst Oscar venturing out in a public space with his cousin in the current climate, and whilst his court case is still underway was unwise, those of us closest to him have been witnesses to his escalating sense of loneliness. And alienation. This we believe is underlying some of his self harming behavior. As a family, we are a counseling Oscar to find ways of dealing with his feelings of isolation. For many members of the public,

36:21 the incident reinforced doubts about Oscar's self control and judgment, particularly coming so soon after days of emotional testimony about his fragility and fear. For the defense, it was a setback they could ill afford. The prosecution actually see has done some of the language in that statement where they talked about self harming behavior. They tried to get the judge to revoke his bail and basically put him back in prison while he was awaiting hearing the results, but the judge decided not to do that. For Judge Massipa, it was yet another reminder that even if she deliberated, Oscar's remained a deeply complicated and deeply tried We'll be back after a break. Just days before closing arguments, tragedies struck the Pistorius family yet again. Carl Pistorius was involved in a devastating head on collision that crushed both of his legs below the knees. That's Oscar's older brother. For a time, doctors were unsure whether he could survive, let alone walk again. He ultimately pulled through, and on the day the verdict was delivered, Karl appeared in court in a wheelchair, a stark and painful echo of his younger brother's lifelong disability. As a reminder, Judge Massipa had three possible verdicts available to her on the main murder charge. Aside from acquittal, murder with conscious premeditation the most serious charge, murder without premeditation known as duellis

37:54 eventualis the middle ground, and culpable homicide the least serious, equivalent to manslaughter. Most legal observers believed dulus eventualis was the most likely outcome that Oscar had fired with the intent to kill whoever was behind the door, regardless of whether he believed it was Riva or an intruder. In South Africa, a verdict hearing is not a simple announcement. On September eleventh, Judge Messipa spent the entire day methodically reviewing the evidence and explaining her reasons peace by piece. You imagine like you just want to hear what the verdict is and the judge spends a whole day just talking through every piece of the evidence. Yeah, So the courtroom and the country waited overnight. The verdicts were delivered the following morning, and the most serious charge, murdered with conscious premeditation, Judge Messipa found Oscar Pistorius not guilty.

38:46 She ruled that the state had failed to prove Oscar intended to kill Reva. Central to her decision was the timeline presented by the defense, one the prosecution had not successfully challenged. In particular, the state had not proven that an argument occurred before the shots were fired. Then came the charge many believed was inevitable on murder without premeditation dolus eventualis. Judge Messipa again found Oscar not guilty, a decision that stunned much of the legal community. Her reasoning hinged on Oscar's subjective state of mind. In her words, how could the accused reasonably have foreseen that the shots he fired would kill the deceased? Clearly, he did not subjectively foresee this as a possibility. To find otherwise would be tantamount to saying that the accused's reaction after he realized that he had shot the deceased was faked that he was play acting merely to delude the onlookers at the time. However, Judge Messipa did not absolve him entirely.

39:47 She found Oscar guilty of culpable homicide, ruling that while he did not intend to kill, his actions were negligent. He had acted too harshly and used excessive unreasonable force in response to a perceived threat. On the additional firearms charges, the verdicts were mixed. Not guilty of firing a gun through the sunroof of a moving car, not guilty of possessing unlicensed ammunition, guilty of negligently discharging a firearm in a restaurant. For Oscar and his legal team, the outcome was a near best case scenario. Quote. I don't give a shit about the sentence, Oscar reportedly told his lawyer, I am not a murderer. His brother and sister embraced him in the courtroom. For June's steamcamp. The verdict was devastating.

40:34 I just don't feel that this is right, she said. They believe his story, and I don't believe that story. He shot her through the door, and I can't believe that they believed it was an accident, and much of South Africa appeared to agree. Newspaper headlines the next day read Oscar dodges bullet and Oscar's Great escape. International reaction was equally fierce. Donald Trump weighed in, calling the judge a total moron and likening the case to another OJ disaster. Judge Messipa herself became a target, receiving threats, insults, and a torrent of racist and sexist abuse. The legal process had spoken, but for many, justice still felt unresolved.

41:19 With the conviction for culpable homicide, Oscar Pistorius faced a wide sentencing range, though Gazilla Massipa could impose anything from a suspended sentence or community service to a maximum of fifteen years in prison. The sentencing hearing began on October thirteenth. As with much of this case, it was anything but brief. The proceedings stretched over five days, followed by a four day adjournment while Judge Massipa considered her decision. The defense urged leniency. Witnesses testified that Oscar was already a broken man. He had lost his career, his reputation, his freedom, and the life that he once knew. They emphasized the brutal reality of South African prisons and argued that incarceration would be especially punishing for someone with Oscar's disability. Prison, they warned, would not rehabilitate him, it would further destroy him. The prosecution counter that negligence resulting in death demanded real consequences, regardless of fame or physical limitations. When Judge Massiba returned to deliver her sentence, the outcome fell closer to the low end of her options. Oscar Pistorius was sentenced to five years in prison for culpable homicide. He also received a three year sentence for the firearms conviction, but that sentence was fully suspended, meaning it would not be served unless he committed another offense. Under South African law, the practical impact was significant, Oscar could become eligible for release into house arrest after as little as ten months. For

42:50 many South Africans, the sentence felt shockingly light. For others, it reflected the court's belief that this was a tragic case of negligence rather than intentional murder, and once again the question lingered, just as it had since the very beginning. Was this justice served or justice denied? Within South Africa's legal community. Judge Massipa's decision to acquit Oscar Pistorius on the Dolus eventualist charge was met with widespread criticism. A constitutional law professor at the University of Cape Town wrote, pointedly, given all the evidence presented in court about Pistorius's knowledge of guns and what the bullets he used would do to a person, it is unlikely in the extreme that Pistorius did not foresee that the person behind the door, who he might have thought was an intruder, would be killed.

43:39 The criticism wasn't just academic. The State formally appealed Judge Massipa's ruling, and in December twenty fifteen, nearly a year later, the Supreme Court of Appeal delivered its judgment. The appellate Court agreed with the critics. In a sharply worded decision. The judges held that Judge Massipa had aired in her understanding of Dolus eventuala. They said it was a matter of basic common sense that when Oscar fired the shots, the possibility that the person behind the door could be killed was obvious, and by firing not one but four shots into a confined space, that risk was not just foreseeable. It was amplified. The Supreme Court of Appeal set aside Oscar's conviction for culpable homicide and replaced it with a conviction for murder with criminal intent in the form of dulls eventualis. The case was then sent back to Judge Massipa's trial court for resentencing. I thought it was interesting that the case went back to her for resentencing after she was the one that they said aired in.

44:39 The conviction that she very contradictory. Even with the more serious murder conviction, Judge Massipa still retained significant discretion. She increased Oscar's sentence from five years to six years, so she basically just upped it by one year. That too, was appealed once again. The Supreme Court of Appeal intervened, this time decisively ruling that the sentence was shockingly lenient. The court substituted its own sentence. Oscar Pistorius's punishment was increased to fifteen years in prison. After years of trials, appeals, reversals, and revision, the legal system had reached a far harsher conclusion than it had at first. Oscar Pistorius served his sentence at a correctional facility in Pretoria. In January twenty twenty four, after serving just over ten years behind bars, he was released on parole.

45:31 He remains under strict supervision until his sentence formally ends in twenty twenty nine. Oscar now lives at the home of his uncle Arnold, also in Pretoria. As a condition of his parole, he is required to attend programs addressing gender based violence and anger management. He's prohibited from consuming alcohol and barred from speaking to the media. Legally, the case is over, but for Riva Steinkamp's family, justice has never been a finish line. It's something that they have had to learn to live without, alongside grief, anger, and an absence that never fades. Riva was twenty nine years old when she died. She was a law graduate, a working model, a daughter, a friend, a woman who believed deeply in kindness, integrity, and speaking out for others, especially women whose voices were so often ignored. She spoke publicly against rape and domestic violence in a country where both were endemic. In her final days, she was stepping into her own spotlight, not as someone's girlfriend, but as herself.

46:32 In one of the last pieces of footage recorded before her death, Riva spoke about how she tried to live her life with honesty, compassion, and courage. Those words aired just two days after she was killed. Oscar Pistorius's name will be forever tied to this case. His rise, his falls, his trials, and his sentences have been analyzed from every possible angle. But Riva was never meant to be a footnote in someone else's story. She was the story. Her life mattter long before that night, and it matters still not because of how she died, but because of who she was, what she believed, and the future that she never got the chance to live. And if there's anything to take from this case, it's this, Riva Steinecamp should be remembered not as a victim in a headline, but as a woman whose life had meaning independent of the man who took it. Rest in peace, Reva. The big question in this case, of course, is whether justice was actually served or not. Did the you know, I took a lot of iterations with the appeals and everything, but did the judicial system ultimately get it right? Was it the right verdict? And how about the sentence? Was it the right sentence?

47:41 What do you think, well, let me turn that around to you, because the judge was making the decision. Had this been a jury trial, do you think there was enough evidence that a jury would have found Oscar guilty of any of those charges. I do not think there was enough evidence to find him guilty of premeditated murder. I know a lot of people want that to be the case, and it very well could have been the case that it was premeditated murder. But in a court, rulings are made by whether there's evidence or not, and I don't think there was enough evidence to say that he murdered her, you know, intentionally that yes, I'm going to kill you after an argument or something like that. So I don't think there was enough evidence if I was on a jury, to convict him of that.

48:24 I think there is enough evidence to show that he had an anger problem, that he had a hair trigger. It didn't take much to set him off. But I don't know if we can get to that night was at three am when it happened. At three am, they were still awake and they were having an argument, and I don't think that anything had happened, like they had a tumultuous relationship, but it doesn't sound like there's any proof that anything happened that night that would have caused him to wake up at three am and shoot her. Yeah, And that's what I think makes this case so difficult, because there was all that evidence that he had an anger problem, that he was jealous, he was controlling, So he had all these elements of people that do often kill their partners.

49:07 Yeah, he had characteristics of someone who would commit domestic violence against his significant other. Sure. Yeah. I do think though that the appeal court was correct in that middle charge. It's a little bit confusing, but that middle charge was basically, he meant to kill whoever was behind that door, regardless of whether he thought it was Riva or an intruder. And it seems ridiculous that she found him not guilty of that because you fire four bullets. There are these dumb, dumb bullets that basically, you know, expand on impact. You fire that through a door of a small room where you know someone is behind there. How could you say that he didn't think that that would result in that person's death.

49:50 I guess would the laws be different here that if there's an intruder in your home, you're allowed to shoot them. Yeah, I think that that is the case. That would be different. And here I'm not sure. You know, every state is different, has different you know, degrees of homicide and things like that, so I'm not sure if the equivalent charge exists here or not. I think the difference between manslaughter and premeditated murder is pretty clear, but that dolus eventualis charge is a little confusing. I think if Oscar lived here in the United States, he would have been acquitted on all charges. Oh really, you don't think he would have been found guilty of manslaughter. I don't think so. Thinking back to OJ, you know, OJ was a celebrity and yeah, there was a lot of evidence against JOJ I believe. I don't think we'll ever cover that case, but I think that, yeah, he would.

50:38 Have been able to hire the best lawyers and manipulate the legal system as best he could. It's yeah, it's interesting to speculate, but it's very possible. Although in Oscar's case, there was no doubt that he fired the bullets that killed her, it's true, so I still think maybe manslaughter, but yeah, he probably wouldn't have spent He wouldn't have spent fifteen years in prison. I mean, it is like, I'm not saying that he's not guilty. I'm just not sure if there is enough evidence. But what do you think was there a motive? I well, if he did kill her in a premeditated way, I would say it was. The motive would have been more like they had an argument that escalated and he grabbed the gun and shot her in a fit of rage.

51:18 And like you said, we're not saying that didn't happen. It might have happened, but you know, there's just not enough evidence to convict somebody of that when beyond a reasonable doubt. I don't think. I thought it was interesting that Judge Masipa seemed very sympathetic toward Oscar, because when I first learned about her, you know, it came out that she was very tough on men who committed violence against women. She seemed to have no you know, she didn't suffer fools gladly, but she seemed like she had I don't know, maybe this is just me reading into it, but it seemed like she had a soft spot for Oscar. Like she found him guilty of the least serious charge that she could have. She sentenced him very much on the low end even when it came back from the appeal court. Okay, at a year to it.

52:01 But well, you said he was very emotional every day in the trial, like sobbing and wretching, and you know, maybe she viewed him and she thought, you know, I don't believe that he's guilty. Yeah, she was. It's easy for us to sit here and analyze the judge and say, oh, she didn't do a good job. But you know, sitting there for months listening to the evidence, you probably do have a different interpretation of it, you. Know, and there is no doubt that Oscar was incredibly emotional. And you know, in this whole trial he broke down so many times. Obviously he was deeply affected by what he did. Doesn't make him not guilty of it, but he was deeply affected and maybe that did impact the way that the judge viewed him.

52:44 It's important for us to remember that you can commit the most horrible violent act and still feel bad about it, right even if you you know, if you did it intentionally, you can still deeply regret it and have a lot of emotion absolutely tied to that. So you know, we have to be careful that we don't interpret someone's emotion as insecuilty. Yeah, exactly. I really struggle with a contradiction in this case because, on the one hand, I'm genuinely moved by the adversity that Oscar Pistorius overcame. When I read about his trials, his challenges and overcoming this disability that he had, and his drive and motivation, it's inspiring, like it really is, and he was a role model to a lot of people, especially other people who are differently abled. But on the other hand, at the very least, he had this pattern of reckless and dangerous behavior. He was not a great guy when it came to his relationships. He was controlling, possessive.

53:42 I just have a hard time with this case because I really just have two extremely opposite reactions to him, and it's hard for me to kind of reconcile those two things in my mind. I mean, people can be more than one thing. No one can take his accomplishments away from him, But that doesn't mean he's a great man at all aspect. Yes, absolutely, and you're right, no one can take his accomplishments away. But at the same time, I think his legacy is pretty much ruined from this point forward. I mean, he's still a youngish man. It'll be interesting to see. It will be what he does with the rest of his life. Yeah, and especially when his parole is up. I think in twenty twenty nine. He's not allowed to speak to the media until then, so we haven't heard anything from him in many years, so that'll be interesting as well when that happens, what he has to say.

54:29 Our deepest sympathies again go to Reva's family. It can't be overstated how lovely Reva seemed, and how she's another victim that has gotten lost in this story. Yeah, for sure. And just when I think of her final moments, it's just so so sad that she was in this little urifying Yeah, she must have been just terrified, and it's really awful to think about that. We would really love to hear how you feel about this case as well, whether you felt that same tension between admiration for Oscar's achievements and accountability. How do you reconcile those things? Do you believe that justice was served? So let us know what you think before we go. I did want to mention my primary sources. This is one of those situations where there is so much information out there about the case that you could spend years researching this.

55:17 Now I'm working at a case like that right now, and it's killing me. It's tough. So you have to choose carefully which sources to go to, otherwise you could spend a huge amount of time. My main source was a book called Chase Your Shadow, The Trials of Oscar Pistorius by John Carlin. It was a very thorough detailed look at the whole case was I felt like it was mostly unbiased. There was sometimes I thought it maybe leaned a little towards sympathy for Oscar, maybe a little heavily, But overall I felt like it was a pretty unbiased look at the whole the whole case. There was also a four part ESPN documentary part of their thirty for thirty series called The Life and Trials of Oscar Pastorius, which is available on Netflix and I recommend it. I used several other sources as well, which I'll include in the show notes.

56:03 One source that I unfortunately wasn't able to use was a three part documentary called My Name is Reva. Supposedly, this documentary is more focused on Reva's Life, but unfortunately it's not currently available to watch in the US. If you happen to be in Europe, I think you can watch it over there, but not here in the US. It happens to us a lot working on international cases, sometimes sources aren't available to us. So if you have recommended an international case and we haven't done it, that could be why, because it's hard to gather all the sources. I always think I can find a way around it too, but you really can't. Yeah, well, especially like in Australia, because we've done a bunch of cases in Australia. To have the book shipped here, it's also prohibitively expensive.

56:47 Right, So we talked to fair amount in this case about athletics, about track and field and running. And I should probably know this, but did you have any special talents? Were you? Were you fast when you were young? I was the third fastest runner in third grade. I think that was my. That was your peak? Was No? I knew. I've always been a pretty okay runner. Actually that's not at all true anyway. I don't really run once in a while, like I remember run a five k, But growing up I was not athletic. Yeah, I haven't run it in a long time, but I was. I was never fast growing up. Yeah, I have like short little legs compared I.

57:28 Was, Well, that is not an excuse, because there's a lot of good runners that have short legs. Yeah, I guess I'm going to use that as my excuse. We had when I was in elementary school, I think was in sixth grade, we had what it was called the Olympics, and it was basically all the different schools in our school district would send people to do like a big track and field of that, and it was like a prestigious thing to get picked to go to the Olympics, and so I wanted it so so bad. It was like a lot of fun. Probably I wouldn't know because I didn't make it. Sadly, I thought I was going to make it on the rope climb. That was the one thing I was pretty decent at. It was like climbing up the rope. But I didn't even make it on that either. So the rope climb was my nightmare.

58:10 Oh really, Oh my gosh. Yeah, And both of our kids are kind of like they're little monkeys. So when I saw our kids have those, you know, being athletic. I was a little surprised because I'm just not really super athletic. But it was kind of the way I grew up too, Like we weren't really encouraged to do a lot of sports and things. Yeah, I was real. It was really sad. I was really like I wanted it so, like more than I wanted anything. And I was you played baseball and you did other sports. I didn't just baseball. Really it was the only thing I played growing up. But well, you really would have done well at football, I bet. I mean you were like it was pretty small. You're I pursued academic pursuits. You could beat them all in the spelling bee.

58:52 And you you did in the old spelling bee. Yeah. Yeah, Do you want to tell the story about the dictionary that has your name on it? Well, when I won I won the sixth grade school spelling Bee, I went on to the district and they gave me a dictionary with my name engraved on the cover, and my name was spelled wrong. I'm so funny, And so I went back I took it to my principal. I said, they spelled my name wrong, and he was like, well, that isn't that ironic? And so he actually got me a new one with my name spelled correctly. So for many years I had two dictionaries with my name engraved, one with it spelled wrong and one with it correct. I don't know what happened to them. I think we still have one of them. I think we do. Yeah, that's a great story. Tell us more about your well, do you want to know the word that academic success?

59:36 When? Yeah, I do. The word that I went out on in the district. So in the district spelling bee, I came in fourth, which was pretty darn good I felt. But the word I went out on was resonant, and yeah, I had never I had never heard the word before. When I got it, I'm like, I don't even know what that word means. Like, how did you spell it? I heard in my mind I heard resonant R E S, I M E N T. Because I really didn't know what that word was. So I just gave it my best shot. That's a great could you can you pend me a Titian tearing. Up oder so many sad stories. We talked a little bit at the end of our case about OJ. Yeah, you said, we would probably never cover that case, but now I'm thinking maybe I should cover that because it really is.

1:00:20 A well, you know, the case I want you like, if you were going to ask me, you never asked me what I wanted for my birthday, I was going to say, I want you to do the John Benet Ramsey case, but you don't like to make my dreams and which has come true. So I'm just I am intimidated by that case. I was fascinated by Jean Bonnet Ramsey. Yeah when you know the first book came out about it. I read it cover to cover. I was really fascinated by it. But now I'm just intimidated by it because it just feels like, well. If you guys think we need to do that case, please just leave a message. On Okay, if enough people. Social media or show notes or. Whatever public demands it, maybe I'll do it. Consider it. But but I wanted to talk about OJ. Yeah. I think do you think most people most people think OJ did it? Right?

1:01:03 Oh? Yeah, I think so. What percentage of people do you think think OJ did it? I don't know. I mean there are people that think that he was framed, and I would say probably eighty percent. I think that he's probably good. But I remember we had just started dating when the verdict was announced, and who called me at work? It was really funny. It is one of those moments. It's like, you know, I guess you were older, like the Kennedy assassination, or I guess at nine to eleven, like you remember exactly where you were at that time, what you were doing, And yeah, I was at work at the Romulus engine plant. There was a TV on in the corner. It was like everybody was glued to it. Do you remember the Oscar Pistoria's case when it happened?

1:01:46 No, not really. I mean I definitely heard about it, but I did not follow it super closely, and it didn't have I don't think it had the same impact here in the US as the OJ case. No, definitely not. But it was definitely covered here. Yeah, pretty, I mean pretty largely. Pardon my English. It's okay. It's been a long, a long three part episode. Put a fork in me. I'm done, all right, I will put a fork in you until next time. Don't kill your wife, don't kill your husband.

1:03:00 Yes,