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Oscar Pistorius is granted bail

Fri, 22 Feb 2013 15:01:00 +0000

UPDATED: Feb. 22 at 10:01am

Oscar Pistorius will be freed from custody pending his trial in the Feb. 14 shooting death of Reeva Steenkamp, and magistrate Desmond Nair has set bail at 1 million rand (approximately $112,771 USD).

Pistorius will be released until his next court appearance on June 4. As a condition of his bail, he must surrender his passport and all travel documents. He will also be forced to turn in all of his weapons and firearms, and is prohibited from purchasing or owning additional firearms.

He will report to a probation and correctional officer upon his release and until the case concludes.

Nair said Pistorius' sworn statement about the events of the morning of the fatal shooting -- in which the athlete says he shot Steenkamp "accidentally," because he believed she was an intruder -- had been a consideration and helped his application for bail.

Pistorius shot and killed Steenkamp. He has been charged with premeditated murder.

UPDATED: Feb. 22 at 9:31am

Oscar Pistorius will be freed from custody pending his trial in the Feb. 14 shooting death of Reeva Steenkamp.

Oscar Pistorius bail hearing delayed until Tuesday

Fri, 15 Feb 2013 14:05:00 +0000

Athlete Oscar Pistorius, known around the world as the "Blade Runner" for becoming the first double-amputee to compete in the Olympics, shocked the world yesterday when he was charged for the murder of his girlfriend, South African model Reeva Steenkamp, who died at his home early morning on Valentine's Day. But a Pretoria judge has delayed Pistorius' bail hearing, originally scheduled for Friday, to Tuesday as the troubled athlete repeatedly lost his composure in court.

Reports the Guardian:

The South African athlete...repeatedly pressed his fingers to his eyes and looked down, sobbing and shaking, in an hour-long hearing in a packed courtroom in Pretoria.

The magistrate delayed Pistorius's bail hearing until Tuesday and ruled that the 26-year-old would be held at a Pretoria police station until then, despite a likely perception of "preferential treatment", since it would be more common for the accused to be detained in prison.

5 creepiest surveillance tactics

Thu, 13 Dec 2012 16:12:00 +0000

Since the erosion of Americans' civil liberties depends on high levels of public apathy, some of the most dangerous privacy breaches take place incrementally and under the radar; if it invites comparisons to Blade Runner or Orwell, then someone in the PR department didn't do their job. Meanwhile, some of the biggest threats to privacy, like insecure online data or iPhone GPS tracking, are physically unobtrusive and therefore easily ignored. And it'll be at least a year or two until the sky is overrun by spy drones.

So when a method of surveillance literally resembles a prop or plot point in a sci-fi movie, it helps to reveal just how widespread and sophisticated commercial and government monitoring has become. Here are five recent developments that seem almost unreal in their dystopian creepiness.

1. Buses and street cars that can hear what you say.