Oscar Pistorius appeal to be heard before year-end

The challenge against Oscar Pistorius’s acquittal on a murder charge will be heard before the end of the year.

Supreme Court of Appeal registrar Paul Myburgh confirmed that the court will hear the case in the fourth term‚ that starts at the beginning of November. He said that no exact date has been decided on as yet.

Pistorius‚ 28‚ was convicted of culpable homicide in the North Gauteng High Court in Pretoria in September last year for shooting and killing his girlfriend‚ Reeva Steenkamp. He shot Steenkamp through a locked toilet door in his Pretoria home on February 14 2013.

Judge Thokozile Masipa acquitted him of murder‚ accepting his version that he mistook Steenkamp for an intruder.

Pistorius was sentenced to five years in jail.

He was also found guilty of unlawfully and negligently discharging a fire-arm at Tasha’s restaurant and received a suspended sentence for the crime.

The prosecutors were given permission by Masipa to ask the Supreme Court of Appeal‚ in Bloemfontein‚ to consider whether she had applied the law correctly in finding Pistorius not guilty of murder.

The appeal may be heard just three months after Pistorius could be released from prison.

According to his sentence‚ he must serve one sixth of his five-year jail term — that is 10 months — before he can apply to have it converted to correctional supervision. These ten months will be over on August 21‚ which could see Pistorius celebrate his 29th birthday on November 22 out of prison‚ albeit under house arrest.