Stephanie Scott's family receive another painful blow following her father's freak death.

Vincent Stanford, the man who brutally raped and murdered school teacher Stephanie Scott, plans to appeal his sentence.

The 25-year-old was jailed for life by a NSW court last month, in a case the judge described as “one of great heinousness”.

But, according to The Daily Mail, the state’s Criminal Court of Appeal last week received a notice of intention to appeal from the former cleaner’s legal team.

The revelation follows the tragic death of Scott’s father, Robert, whose body was found on the family’s property in the Riverena town of Canowindra. It’s believed the retired teacher was fatally injured by a falling tree.

Stanford pleaded guilty in July to the aggravated sexual assault and murder of Scott, whom he killed on Easter Sunday, 2015.

The teacher was working overtime preparing lessons for a substitute, when Stanford set upon her in the Leeton High School staffroom, raped her, bashed her and later stabbed her in the neck.

After an intensive police search, Scott’s naked, badly burnt body was eventually found 70km away at Cocoparra National Park on April 10, 2015 – just days before she was due to be married to partner Aaron Leeson-Woolley.

Stephanie Scott and her fiance, Aaron. Image: Facebook.

During Stanford's October sentencing hearing, the court heard he had stalked three other people prior to Scott’s murder, including two adults and a 12-year-old girl of whom he had 1805 images.

But it was perhaps his confession to Scott’s murder which proved most chilling. In audio of his police interview, which was played to the court, Stanford said he “went a little nuts” when he killed the 26-year-old.

“I don’t know, I just felt like I should do it,” he told investigators. “Just that I had to kill her.”

“I think I needed to see a psychiatrist but I didn’t.”

READ MORE: Stephanie Scott murder: Who is her killer Vincent Stanford?