Pistorius jailed for six years for murder
Pretoria : Paralympian Oscar Pistorius has been sentenced to six years in prison for murdering his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp three years ago.
Pistorius had been freed from prison in the South African capital Pretoria last October after serving one year of a five-year term for culpable homicide - the equivalent of manslaughter.
But an appeals court upgraded the conviction to murder, which has a mandatory sentence of 15 years.
Pistorius, 29, shot Steenkamp in the early hours of Valentine's Day in 2013, claiming he mistook her for a burglar when he fired four times through the door of his bedroom toilet.
"It is very difficult to predict what sentence it is that will be imposed ... This a fairly unique situation," Stephan Terblanche, a law professor at the University of South Africa, told the AFP news agency.
Legal expert Llewellyn Curlewis, chair of the Law Society of the Northern Provinces, said that he expected a sentence of between 11 and 14 years.
Related Posts