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| Oscar Pistorius Acquittal Can Be Appealed, Judge Says | Oscar Pistorius Acquittal Can Be Appealed, Judge Says |
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| LONDON — A South African judge ruled on Wednesday that prosecutors may appeal her decision to acquit Oscar Pistorius, the disabled track star, on murder charges in the killing of his girlfriend last year. | LONDON — A South African judge ruled on Wednesday that prosecutors may appeal her decision to acquit Oscar Pistorius, the disabled track star, on murder charges in the killing of his girlfriend last year. |
| But, in a complex ruling, Judge Thokozile Matilda Masipa rejected efforts by state prosecutors to appeal against the five-year sentence she passed on him. | But, in a complex ruling, Judge Thokozile Matilda Masipa rejected efforts by state prosecutors to appeal against the five-year sentence she passed on him. |
| The prosecution had called the sentence “shockingly inappropriate” to the crime since Mr. Pistorius could be released into house arrest after 10 months in the hospital wing of a prison in Pretoria, the South African capital. | The prosecution had called the sentence “shockingly inappropriate” to the crime since Mr. Pistorius could be released into house arrest after 10 months in the hospital wing of a prison in Pretoria, the South African capital. |
| In October, Judge Masipa acquitted Mr. Pistorius of murder but found him guilty of culpable homicide, equivalent to manslaughter, for firing four rounds from a handgun through a locked toilet cubicle door, killing his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp, on the other side. | In October, Judge Masipa acquitted Mr. Pistorius of murder but found him guilty of culpable homicide, equivalent to manslaughter, for firing four rounds from a handgun through a locked toilet cubicle door, killing his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp, on the other side. |
| The judge’s ruling on Wednesday hinged on a distinction in South African law between culpable homicide, equivalent to manslaughter, and a form of murder when a defendant is accused of knowing that his actions may cause death. | The judge’s ruling on Wednesday hinged on a distinction in South African law between culpable homicide, equivalent to manslaughter, and a form of murder when a defendant is accused of knowing that his actions may cause death. |
| On Tuesday, the state prosecutor, Gerrie Nel, argued that Mr. Pistorius must have understood the likely outcome of opening fire and that he had therefore committed a form of murder regarded as a more serious crime than culpable homicide but a lesser offense than premeditated murder, which carries a 25-year minimum sentence. | On Tuesday, the state prosecutor, Gerrie Nel, argued that Mr. Pistorius must have understood the likely outcome of opening fire and that he had therefore committed a form of murder regarded as a more serious crime than culpable homicide but a lesser offense than premeditated murder, which carries a 25-year minimum sentence. |
| In a ruling streamed live on South African news websites from the North Gauteng High Court in Pretoria, Judge Masipa said the issue was “not an easy one.” | |
| On the sentence, she said she was “not persuaded that there was any material misdirection” when she sent Mr. Pistorius to prison for what some legal experts said seemed to be a relatively lenient sentence. | On the sentence, she said she was “not persuaded that there was any material misdirection” when she sent Mr. Pistorius to prison for what some legal experts said seemed to be a relatively lenient sentence. |
| But on the grounds for her verdict, she said the Supreme Court of Appeal should consider whether a principle known as dolus eventualis — the grounds for a form of murder — had been “correctly applied.” | |
| “I cannot say the prospect of success at the Supreme Court is remote,” she said. | “I cannot say the prospect of success at the Supreme Court is remote,” she said. |
| Her ruling represented a victory for South African prosecutors who had suffered setbacks in two high-profile trials: the Pistorius case and the acquittal on Monday of Shrien Dewani, a British businessman accused of arranging for the murder of his wife on their honeymoon in Cape Town in 2010. | |
| Mr. Dewani returned to Britain from South Africa on Wednesday. | |
| In the Pistorius case, it was not immediately clear when the appeal would be heard. | |
| “Our argument was that he should have been convicted of murder, and then would have been sentenced to a minimum sentence of 15 years,” said Nathi Mncube, the spokesman for the National Prosecuting Authority. | |
| Mr. Pistorius has admitted shooting Ms. Steenkamp, a 29-year-old law graduate and model, at his villa in a gated complex in Pretoria on Feb. 14, 2013. But he argued that he believed an intruder had entered his home when he opened fire, and that he was unaware that Ms. Steenkamp was in the toilet cubicle. | |
| The prosecution, which also accused him of premeditated murder, the most serious homicide charge, said that the couple had argued and that Mr. Pistorius had fired in a jealous rage. | |
| His trial opened in March and was initially set to last three weeks. With frequent delays and adjournments — including weeks of psychiatric tests, which found the athlete fit to stand trial — the case lasted months and is now set to run further. | |
| At the time of the shooting, Mr. Pistorius, who was born without fibula bones and has been a double amputee since infancy, seemed at the peak of his athletic prowess. | |
| Months earlier, he had competed in both the Olympic and the Paralympic Games in London in 2012. Internationally, he was seen as a star who had drawn on wells of perseverance to overcome his disability, while, in South Africa, he had celebrity status alongside his glamorous girlfriend — a golden couple. | |
| The shooting ended it all. Sponsors abandoned him, and he stopped competing. Later, the Paralympic movement banned him from competition for the five years of his sentence. | |
| In court, he appeared as a distraught figure, frequently overcome by his emotions, weeping and retching as Mr. Nel, the prosecutor, confronted him with grisly images of Ms. Steenkamp’s bloodstained body. | |
| Members of the runner’s family took issue with the outcome of Wednesday’s hearing but said they would abide by the judge’s ruling. “It should not have gone this far,” Henke Pistorius, Oscar Pistorius’s father, told reporters. |