South African sprinter Oscar Pistorius was in back court Tuesday for his first appearance since being granted bail Feb. 22 following the shooting of his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp, on Valentine’s Day. But the hearing was short-lived and quickly postponed, with a new date now set for Aug. 19.
The hearing lasted only 15 minutes while the prosecution asked for the trial to be postponed, and then a court official criticized the “trial by media” that included a recent British TV special during which Steenkamp’s mother, June, brought Pistorius’s character into question and asked for answers about her daughter’s tragic death.
“Why? Why did he shoot her? I want to know why he shot her,” she said. “Because she must have been so afraid in the toilet, and somebody’s firing a gun, bullets through the door.”
Pistorius, 26, admitted to shooting Steenkamp three times through his bathroom door on February 14, but claims he thought she was an intruder, and only after he fired did he considered it might have been Steenkamp. He then called paramedics and carried her downstairs, where she died in his arms.
The defense agreed on the terms of postponement, which weren’t immediately made public. Pistorius has rarely been seen in public since February and has already ruled out competitive running in 2013.
