Oscar Pistorius leaves the North Gauteng High Court(Picture: Getty)

Oscar Pistorius, convicted of killing girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp, has been denied leave to appeal.

South Africa’s Constitutional Court on Thursday rejected Olympian Oscar Pisitorius the right to appeal against his conviction for the murder of girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp, television news channel ENCA reported.

The news station said that the highest court in the country ruled that Pistorius had no reasonable grounds of success on his appeal.

His lawyer confirmed the highest court had dismissed his appeal of murder conviction.


Pistorius now faces a possible minimum 15-year jail sentence for the murder of his girlfriend.

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Oscar Pistorius with his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp (Picture: EPA)

He shot girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp dead through the door of a bathroom in his home in Pretoria on Valentine’s Day 2013.



He originally claimed he mistook her for an intruder when he opened fire at the locked door of his bedroom toilet.

Pistorius applied to appeal to South Africa’s Constitutional Court in a final bid to overturn his conviction for killing his partner.

A judge overturned the former Paralympic champion’s culpable homicide conviction in December 2015.

Pistorius had served one year of his five-year sentence for culpable homicide (what we call manslaughter in the UK) when was released from jail in October and placed under house arrest at the home of his uncle in Pretoria.

The ruling clears the way for a judge to sentence Pistorius for murder at a hearing scheduled for April 18.

Defence lawyer Andrew Fawcett confirmed the court’s decision and said: ‘We’ll proceed to the sentencing.’

The minimum sentence for murder in South Africa is 15 years, though a judge can reduce that sentence in exceptional circumstances.

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