South Africa: Oscar Pistorius’s Appeal of Conviction Is Rejected

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/04/world/africa/south-africa-oscar-pistoriuss-appeal-of-conviction-is-rejected.html

Version 0 of 1.

South Africa’s highest court on Thursday dismissed a final appeal from the former track star Oscar Pistorius to overturn his murder conviction, said one of his lawyers, Andrew Fawcett. The ruling, by the Constitutional Court, clears the way for a judge to sentence Mr. Pistorius, a double-amputee, at a hearing on April 18. The minimum sentence for murder in South Africa is 15 years. Mr. Pistorius, who killed his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp, in his home in 2013, had appealed to the Constitutional Court, saying the Supreme Court of Appeal, the country’s second-highest court, had erred when it overturned a manslaughter conviction and declared him guilty of murder in December.