Pistorius trial’s Judge Masipa

Pistorius trial’s Judge Masipa: tough on violence against women

Judge Thokozile Matilda Masipa has a reputation for delivering severe sentences in cases of violence against women, though the spokesman for the South African judiciary has denied that this is the reason she was put in charge of the Oscar Pistorius trial.

Pistorius trial’s Judge Masipa

masipaBecause there are no juries in South African courts, global media attention has focused on Thokozile Matilda Masipawho is the judge in Oscar Pistorius’ trial. Born in Soweto, Johannesburg in 1947, Masipa is only the second black female judge to be appointed to the bench since apartheid. Before beginning her law career Masipa was a social worker and then a crime reporter for The World, The Post and The Sowetan, focusing on the injustices of life under apartheid. She became an advocate in her late 40s and was appointed as a judge in North Gauteng High Court in 1998.

In the last sixteen years she has presided over several high-profile cases, including that of Shepherd Moyo last year in which she handed down a 252-year sentence to the serial rapist and robber. During sentencing Judge Masipa said: “The worst thing in my view is that he attacked and raped the victims in the sanctity of their own homes where they thought they were safe.” In 2011 she also handed out a maximum life sentence to Freddy Mashamba, a policeman who shot and killed his wife, during which she said: “No one is above the law. You deserve to go to jail for life because you are not a protector, you are a killer.”

In 2001 Masipa sentenced two rapists to life in prison, explaining, “Women feel unsafe, even in the sanctity of their own homes, and look to these courts to protect their interests, which courts can only do by meting out harsh sentences.” She consequently has a reputation for delivering severe sentences in cases of violence against women, though the spokesman for the South African judiciary has denied that this is the reason she was put in charge of this particular case.

Statistics show that 90 percent of women in South Africa have experienced physical or emotional abuse, and there is also an extremely high rate of ‘intimate femicide’. Speaking to the Telegraph newspaper, Lerato Moloi of the South African Institute for Race Relations said: “If data for all violent assaults, rapes and other sexual assaults against women are taken into account, then approximately 200,000 adult women are reported as being attacked in South Africa every year.”  A recent study revealed that South Africa has “the highest rate ever (of violence against women) reported in research anywhere in the world,” which is more than twice the rate in the USA.

Judge Masipa was one of seven female judges featured in the 2008 film Courting Justice, which was directed by Jane Lipman and examined “South Africa’s transformation from apartheid to a human rights-based constitutional democracy”.

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