REEVA Steenkamp’s sister has asked “did he want a lookalike?” after reports emerged that killer Oscar Pistorius has found love after being released from prison.
Simone Cowburn, 59, spoke of her shock when she saw the killer Olympian’s new partner – and the striking similarity to her beloved sibling.
Reeva Steenkamp with her killer Oscar Pistorius[/caption]
Convicted killer Oscar Pistorius is said to have found new love with pictured Rita Geyling[/caption]
Former Paralympic champion Oscar Pistorius smiles as he leaves the North Gauteng High Court in Pretoria, South Africa[/caption]
Reeve was brutally killed by four “dum dum” bullets fired through a bathroom door by the former athletics star.
The disgraced former Paralympian, 38, served nine years behind bars for gunning down his model girlfriend on Valentines Day in 2013.
But he has apparently made time to find a new girlfriend since he was released on parole in January.
Pistorius has been spotted with multi-millionaire farmer’s daughter Rita Greyling, 33, and close friends have said they have been romantically linked for 3 months, according to Netwerk24.
Rita is a business management consultant from Wakkerstroom in Mpumulanga and a long-term family friend of Pistorius.
Reeva’s sister Simone wept yesterday as she read the story of Oscar not only beginning to rebuild his life but finding a new woman after serving only nine years behind bars.
Simone said at her home in Port Elizabeth, South Africa: “I am just looking at this woman’s photographs and I have goosebumps and shivers going down my spine at this moment.
“What shocks me is that she looks so much like my Reeva.
“She is the same build, the same face and hair, even the same eyes. Is he that sick that he wanted to find a lookalike?
“I have to ask myself that having killed Reeva did he want to replace her with another?”
Simone then reflected on new girlfriend Rita, wondering “how a woman can close her eyes at night and go to sleep with a man she knows fired four bullets that mutilate flesh into a woman he says he loved”.
Oscar Pistorius and Reeva Steenkamp at the Tasha’s All White Party in 2012[/caption]
Reeva Steenkamp in Johannesburg, South Africa[/caption]
Rita, a blonde lookalike of his tragic victim Reeva, is Pistorius’ family friend[/caption]
New girlfriend Rita Greyling is a business management consultant[/caption]
The heartbroken sister added: “How can you cuddle up to a man that you know has that trigger lurking inside him?
“It just goes to show me even more that he has no remorse for what he did to Reeva.”
Simone told a tale of how her sister found Oscar “totally charming” for their first three months which “no doubt” his new girlfriend feels too, but then he “changes and becomes “more controlling”.
She even revealed how she “will always be convinced” Reeva ended the relationship the night she was killed, and Pistorius “lost all control”.
Simone added: “If he couldn’t have her no-one could so he got his gun and shot her.
“He murdered her. Those were specialised bullets that mushroom on impact with the human flesh.
“This new woman knows a judge found him guilty of murder which means she must know that he has been found capable of doing that to a woman but she sleeps with him?”
Reeva’s sister made a warning to new girlfriend Rita to “sleep with one eye open,” saying he has “the potential to do again” what he did to her sister which she doesn’t want a repeat of.
Simone said: “I am just so shocked he has chosen a woman that looks so like my Reeva.
“I can’t help thinking that having got rid of one Reeva he has gone out and got another.”
Pistorius, dubbed the Blade Runner, was released into a media storm when he was granted parole on January 5 this year, still insisting he killed stunning law graduate and model Reeva by mistake.
Sources close to the couple have confirmed to Netwerk24 that Pistorius and Rita have been together for three months though details are being kept strictly private.
A source close to Pistorius said: “He is trying to rebuild his life in a low-key way and avoids bars and restaurants and the general public and is flying under the radar.
“He is slowly trying to reintegrate into society but that is being done through families that his family have been close to for decades and is slowly slowly.
“The word on the street for three months now is that he is dating again.”
Rita is the daughter of mega rich and well-known multi-millionaire farmer BP Greyling who is one of the biggest figures in the South African farming world.
Dad BP was South African Farmer Of The Year 2011 and is a regular in a Jeremy Clarkson style farming TV series called Megaboere.
He dotes on daughter Rita and son Ghini, 30, who manages his 17,500 hectare farm in Wakkerstroom in Mpumalanga Province which has 6000 cattle and 21,000 sheep.
It is not known if the farmer’s daughter visited Pistorius while he was locked up in Atteridgeville Prison for most of his sentence just a short drive from his uncle’s home.
The murder of Reeva Steenkamp
REEVA Steenkamp was a model and paralegal from South Africa who was killed in 2013.
Steenkamp was born in Cape Town on August 19, 1983.
Steenkamp was introduced to Oscar Pistorius in late 2012 and the pair began dating.
The couple had been together for three months when Reeva was tragically killed.
At his trial Pistorius, known as the “Blade Runner” because of his carbon-fibre prosthetic legs, described how the pair met over a lunch at a car racing track in November 2012.
He said: “I was very keen on Reeva. I think, if anything, I was maybe more into her than she was at times to me.
“I let her just take her space but it wasn’t always easy. I was besotted.”
Steenkamp was shot dead by Pistorius on February 14, 2013.
She was 29 years old at the time of her death.
On the night she was killed, the couple had spent their Valentine’s evening inside Paralympian Pistorius’s flat in Pretoria, South Africa.
Later in the evening, Steenkamp was shot four times through the closed door of their bathroom and Pistorius made a frantic call to emergency services.
She died from her injuries, having been shot in the head, hip and arm.
Steenkamp had gone to the bathroom and Pistorius claimed he woke in their bed and opened fire believing she was a burglar.
Pistorius served his sentence for the killing of Steenkamp at Atteridgeville Correctional Facility.
In January 2024 he was released from prison after serving over half of his 13 years and five months sentence.
Pistorius is said to have difficulty finding work with pals saying employers see him as “toxic” so instead he volunteers at the Dutch Reform Church used by his family cleaning and sweeping.
New love Rita’s family have also made headlines when in late 2022 her farm manager brother Ghini’s close pal died in a mysterious incident at a lodge the family owns.
That November Willem Kruger, 29, disappeared during a party and police in December 2023 said his death had been moved from what was thought as accidental to a murder inquiry.
Friends said that the double death tragedies surrounding both the Pistorius and Greyling families drew them together and gave Oscar and Rita a common bond that has grown.
His sentence ends in 2029, and his parole is subject to checks from the Department of Corrections at any time of day to see he is home and test for alcohol and drugs.
He is not allowed out of the immediate area without informing the local police force and is not allowed a firearm or any contact with Reeva Steenkamp’s mum or sister.
Pistorius was dubbed the “fastest man on no legs” winning gold medals for sprinting in the 2004, 2008 and 2012 Paralympics.
He is the only double amputee to have run in the able-bodied Olympics competing in London in 2012.
Sources close to the reported couple said they have kept their relationship mostly private[/caption]
Greyling is from Wakkerstroom in eastern South Africa[/caption]
Oscar Pistorius is a double leg amputee from South Africa[/caption]
