Kim Kardashian renews her support for black Oklahoma death row inmate

Kim Kardashian has renewed her support for a black death row inmate who she says has been ‘strained with so much racial discrimination’.

Julius Jones was convicted of murder in the 1999 shooting of 45-year-old Paul Howell but says a racist juror tainted the outcome of his 2002 trial. 

In October, Kim appealed to Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt and the state Pardon and Parole Board to consider Jones’s clemency petition.

Kim Kardashian has renewed her support for death row inmate Julius Jones who has spent 20 years locked up for a murder he says he did not commit

The reality star said there is ‘compelling evidence that he was wrongfully convicted’ and went on to share a link to his clemency petition

She said at the time: ‘Yesterday Oklahoma death-row prisoner #JuliusJones asked the Pardon & Parole Board for clemency. Please help by asking the Board and @GovStitt to give careful and thoughtful consideration to his petition @justice4julius.’

She followed-up with another appeal yesterday, writing on Twitter: ‘I have been following the case of Julius Jones for little while now. 

‘Julius Jones is on death row in Oklahoma, despite maintaining his innocence and compelling evidence that he was wrongfully convicted. His case has also been strained with so much racial discrimination.’

The reality star then went on to share a link to his clemency petition and said she learned of Jones’s plight after watching the TV series The Last Defense by Viola Davis which explores his case.

In October, Kim tweeted urging Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt and the state Pardon and Parole Board to consider Jones’ clemency petition

Jones was a 19-year-old honor student on a scholarship at the University of Oklahoma at the time of the murder of Paul Howell in July 1999.

Businessman Mr Howell was shot and killed in the driveway of his parents’ Edmond home and investigators say the suspect then fled in his Suburban.

Jones was arrested along with a co-defendant who fit an eyewitness’s description of the shooter, while Jones did not.

Julius Jones was convicted of murder in the 1999 shooting of 45-year-old Paul Howell, pictured

He claims his friends conspired to frame him after a robbery gone wrong which ended in the murder. 

According to Justice for Julius: ‘In a case riddled with odious racial discrimination — including a police officer’s use of a racial slur during Mr Jones’ arrest and the State’s removal of all prospective black jurors except one —evidence shows that a juror used the n-word before jury deliberations at the sentencing phase. 

‘The US Supreme Court has made unequivocally clear that our criminal justice system cannot tolerate such blatant examples of racial prejudice on the part of even a single juror.’ 

Jones also claims his defense attorneys did not even bring up his alibi at trial and did not call any witnesses to the stand who could have attested for Jones’s location on the night of the killing.

He said: ‘I have spent the past twenty years on death row for a crime I did not commit, did not witness, and was not at. I feel terrible for Mr Howell and his family, but I was not responsible.’

He appealed to the Supreme Court after a juror told Jones’ lawyers in 2017 that another juror used a racist term to describe Jones in his 2002 trial, saying authorities should ‘shoot him behind the jail.’

The court rejected that appeal.

Kardashian has been championing prison reform in recent years, following her success with convincing President Trump to commute the life sentence of nonviolent drug offender Alice Marie Johnson in June 2018.

In April, the mother-of-four revealed that she wants to become a lawyer and is said to be in the midst of a four-year apprenticeship with a San Francisco law firm. She is expected to take the California Bar exam in 2022.