Pistorius faces return to jail for murder

Disgraced South African Paralympic athlete Oscar Pistorius will appear in court Monday for a sentencing hearing set to send him back to jail for murdering his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp three years ago.

The double-amputee killed Steenkamp, a model and law graduate, in the early hours of Valentine's Day 2013, saying he mistook her for an intruder when he fired four times through the door of his bedroom toilet.

In March, Pistorius's lawyers failed in their legal bid to reverse a Supreme Court of Appeal judgement that upgraded his original conviction from culpable homicide - the equivalent of manslaughter - to murder.

He was released from jail last October to live under house arrest at his uncle's mansion in Pretoria after serving one year of his five-year sentence for culpable homicide.

Since being convicted of murder, he has been on bail and allowed to leave the house at set times, but not travel further than 20km without permission.

The 29-year-old "Blade Runner" faces a minimum 15-year jail term for murder, but his sentence could be reduced due to time already spent in prison and mitigating factors, including his disability.

"He has served one year in prison and has been effectively on probation or correctional supervision," Stephan Terblanche, a law professor at the University of South Africa, told AFP.

"But exactly how that is going to be taken into account by the court is difficult to predict."

The case at the High Court in Pretoria was scheduled to last until Friday, though the sentence could be handed down earlier.