Oscar Pistorius has been taken from prison to hospital for medical examinations amid media reports that the convicted murderer and former track star was experiencing chest pains.
Logan Maistry, a spokesman for the Department of Correctional Services, initially told the Associated Press that Pistorius was taken to hospital in Pretoria on Thursday morning and was expected to return to prison later the same day. However, Pistorius would now stay overnight in the hospital for observation, Maistry said.
He declined to give details of Pistorius’s medical complaint, citing department rules preventing the divulging of information on prisoners. He said only that Pistorius was having “medical examinations”.
Reports claimed the Paralympian was experiencing chest pains and was taken by ambulance, escorted by armed guards, from Atteridgeville prison to the emergency department at Kalafong hospital in the South African capital.
Maistry declined to comment on the reports, while a spokesman for Pistorius did not immediately return a phone call from the AP seeking comment.
Pistorius, the double-amputee Paralympic champion and Olympic runner, is serving a six-year jail term for the murder of his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp, in 2013. He has served a year of his sentence.
Pistorius, 30, was first imprisoned at the Kgosi Mampuru II prison in central Pretoria, but was moved to Atteridgeville because it was better equipped for disabled prisoners.
Pistorius was taken to hospital last year for treatment to cuts on his wrists, which prison authorities said he sustained after falling in his cell.
Pistorius was convicted of murder after an appeal by prosecutors against an initial verdict of manslaughter. He killed Steenkamp in the early hours of Valentine’s Day 2013 by shooting her multiple times through a toilet cubicle door at his Pretoria home. Pistorius claimed he mistook his girlfriend for an intruder.
Prosecutors have announced their intention to appeal again, this time against Pistorius’s six-year sentence, which they say is too lenient. The National Prosecuting Authority said it would appeal to South Africa’s supreme court, and the appeal could be heard this year.
If the appeal is successful, Pistorius’s sentence could be increased to 15 years. There is no death penalty in South Africa.
