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Oscar Pistorius Planned On Holding A Private Memorial Service For The Woman He Allegedly Murdered

It’s been about two weeks now since Paralympic and Olympic double amputee athlete Oscar Pistorius allegedly murdered his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp in his Pretoria, South Africa home. There have been some awfully odd developments since, so this, by comparison, might seem somewhat routine: Pistorius held a private memorial service for Steenkamp, as he is still in deep mourning.

By Pistorius’ accounts, he has every right to be mourning his girlfriend — he killed her accidentally, after all. To the rest of the world, however, this is just another strange twist this case has taken since it broke. What started as a most inglorious fall from grace of a national and international icon turned into a series of incomprehensible sideshows, including but not limited to both Pistorius’ brother and the case investigator facing murder charges of their own.

This is a twist of a different nature, though no less WTF-worthy than the rest. Was this supposed to be a positive publicity stunt for Pistorius, or just a sincere attempt at mourning his dead ex-girlfriend in the “privacy of his own home?” It came off as a gutless, toothless attempt at both, scoring him very few sympathy points (which, I don’t even think are up for grabs anymore).

Moreover, I can’t imagine what the Steenkamp family must make of the alleged murderer of their daughter/sister/granddaughter/niece/etc. making public his “private” mourning of the woman he allegedly killed. It sure wouldn’t sit well with me — it doesn’t as it is. There is still so much we don’t know about this case, but under any circumstances, it seems just a tad uncouth to be generating any sort of publicity for you mourning a person you just might have killed.

[via CBS Local]