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Who is Brandon Bernard? Kim Kardashian requests to stop execution of Texas man accused of murdering two ministers

The reality star-turned-prison reform advocate has now highlighted the case of a Texas man

Kim Kardashian is once again using her legal studies in hopes of stopping the execution of a prison inmate. This time, the 40-year-old reality star asked her 67.7 million followers to help her in getting a Texas man's sentence commuted to life in prison, who was involved in the murder of two youth ministers in 1999.

The reality star-turned-prison reform advocate has now highlighted the case of Texas man Brandon Bernard, on Sunday, November 29, she tweeted, "A terrible case has been brought to my attention and I need your help. Without it, on December 12th Brandon Bernard is going to be executed for a crime he participated in as a teenager." She then wrote, "First, I want to say that a terrible crime was committed and me fighting for a stay of execution does not take away from the sympathy I have for the victims Todd and Stacie Bagley, and their families. My heart breaks for everyone involved."

She further defends Bernard by saying, "In fact, Brandon was not a part of the initial carjacking that took place and was stunned when the robbery turned into a homicide with one of the other teens shooting both Todd and Stacie in the head." She further clarified, "The gunman then turned to Brandon, gun still in hand, and told him to light the car Todd and Stacie lay in on fire to destroy the evidence. Brandon believed both were dead, though Stacie was not, and was fearful for his own life, so he made the terrible decision to comply."

40-year-old Bernard was given the death penalty in 2000, for killing two youth ministers in 1999, named, Todd and Stacie Bagley with the help of four teenage (at that time) accomplices in Killeen, Texas. The teens were accused of holding the Bagleys at gunpoint and stealing their car before shooting them dead and burning their bodies in the trunk, as reported by Daily Mail. Last week, Bernard's attorneys requested the federal judge to postpone his execution, insisting that prosecutors suppressed crucial evidence during his trial two decades ago. The Mail reported, "The defense also stated that Bernard was not with his four accomplices when they kidnapped the Bagleys and that he only became involved later because he was a low-level member of a gang that ordered the killings."

Christopher Vialva, who was one of the five co-defendants, was executed in September this year. According to the prosecutors, he was the one who shot the Bagleys. If the Department of Justice doesn't order a stay of execution, Bernard will die by lethal injection at a federal prison complex in Terre Haute, Indiana, on December 10, 2020, according to prison records.

Kim Kardashian also posted a link to an op-ed written by Angela Moore, who was one of the prosecutors who led the case against Bernard in 2000. In that piece, Moore has written that she no longer believes he should be put to death.