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Oscar Leonard Carl Pistorius (/pɪˈstɔːriəs/ pist-OR-ee-əs, Afrikaans: [pəˈstuəriœs]; born 22 November 1986) is a South African former professional sprinter and convicted murderer. He was first convicted of culpable homicide of his then-girlfriend, which was subsequently upgraded to murder upon appeal. Both of his feet were amputated when he was 11 months old as a result of a congenital defect; he was born missing the outside of both feet and both fibulas. Pistorius ran in both nondisabled sprint events and in sprint events for below-knee amputees. He was the 10th athlete to compete at both the Paralympic Games and Olympic Games.
After becoming a Paralympic champion, Pistorius attempted to enter nondisabled international competitions, over persistent objections by the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) and arguments that his artificial limbs gave an unfair advantage. Pistorius prevailed in this legal dispute. At the 2011 World Championships in Athletics, Pistorius was the first amputee to win a nondisabled world track medal. At the 2012 Summer Olympics, Pistorius was the first double-leg amputee participant.
On 14 February 2013, Pistorius shot and killed his girlfriend, paralegal and model Reeva Steenkamp, in his Pretoria home. He claimed he had mistaken Steenkamp for an intruder hiding in the bathroom. He was arrested and charged with murder. At his trial the following year, Pistorius was found not guilty of murder, but guilty of culpable homicide. He received a five-year prison sentence for culpable homicide and a concurrent three-year suspended sentence for a separate reckless endangerment conviction both in October 2014.
Pistorius was temporarily released on house arrest in October 2015 while the case was presented on appeal to a panel at the Supreme Court of Appeal of South Africa, which overturned the culpable homicide verdict and convicted him of murder. In July 2016, Judge Thokozile Masipa extended Pistorius's sentence to six years. On appeal by the state for a longer prison sentence, the Supreme Court of Appeal increased the prison term to a total of 15 years less time served. Pistorius was released on parole on 5 January 2024 after serving a total of 8.5 years in prison, in addition to seven months of house arrest. (Full article...)
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