Pistorius was born on November 22, 1986, in Johannesburg. Born without fibulas, a lower leg bone, he had both legs amputated below the knees before turning one year old.
After learning to walk on prosthetic legs, Pistorius became a sportsman in high school.
He turned to sprint training in 2003 after suffering a serious knee injury playing rugby.
Running on carbon fibre prosthetic blades, earning him the nickname "Blade Runner", Pistorius became a Paralympic gold medallist over 200 metres in Athens in 2004.
In January 2008, Pistorius was banned from running against able-bodied athletes by the sport's governing body, the IAAF, which deemed that his blades provided an unfair advantage, Reuters news agency recalls.
Celebrated medalist
Four months later the Court for Arbitration for Sport ruled that he was eligible to compete in IAAF-sanctioned events. He capped the year by winning three golds at the Paralympics in Beijing.
Pistorius was selected for South Africa's London Games team and in August 2012 he became the first double amputee to compete on the track at an Olympic Games, where he reached the 400 metres semi-finals.
He also carried the flag for South Africa at the opening ceremony of the London Paralympic Games and won two gold medals.
Pistorius was arrested and charged with murder after he fired four shots at his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp through a locked bathroom door at his Pretoria home on Feb. 14, 2013.
He was convicted of culpable homicide in September 2014, but was let off the more serious charge of murder. He started his five-year jail sentence in October, but was a year later released to house arrest.
But the Supreme Court of Appeal in December 2015 overturned the earlier ruling and found Pistorius guilty of murder. Pistorius was sent back to jail for six years in July 2016, which was less than half the 15-year minimum term sought by prosecutors.
The Supreme Court eventually more than doubled his sentence to 13 years and 5 months in November 2017, accepting state prosecu tors' argument that the original jail term was "shockingly lenient".
Release on parole
The South African ex-Olympic runner Oscar Pistorius was released from jail on parole Friday and "is now at home", authorities said, almost 11 years after he shot dead his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp in a crime that gripped the world.
Having served more than half his sentence, the 37-year-old double-amputee was quietly whisked away from the Atteridgeville prison on the outskirts of the capital Pretoria, avoiding the hordes of media gathered outside, AFP news agency reports.
"He was admitted into the system of Community Corrections and is now at home," the department of correctional services said in a statement.
Pistorius has been restricted to staying within the Pretoria district of Waterkloof, where his uncle lives, although precise information on his whereabouts has not been confirmed.
Pistorius killed Steenkamp, a model and law graduate who was 29 years old at the time, in the early hours of Valentine's Day 2013, firing four times through the bathroom door of his ultra-secure Pretoria house.
The shooting came a year after Pistorius made history by being the first double-amputee to race at Olympic level when he appeared at the London 2012 games.
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