The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals unanimously voted to order a stay of execution for Rodney Reed this Friday evening, an hour after the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles officially recommended that Gov. Greg Abbott stop the execution of Reed for a reprieve of 120 days.
This doesn’t mean that Reed won’t be executed and will be freed immediately, but that his “Brady, false testimony, and actual innocence claims” will be heard by the trial court before any further action is taken.
“We are extremely relieved and thankful that the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (CCA) has issued a stay of execution for our client Rodney Reed,” the Innocence Project said in a statement Friday night. “The CCA has ordered the claims of Brady violations, false testimony and actual innocence in Mr. Reed’s case back to the trial court.
“This opportunity will allow for proper consideration of the powerful and mounting new evidence of Mr. Reed’s innocence.”
Reed was convicted of the 1996 killing of Stacey Stites who police say he assaulted, raped and strangled. However, Reed has maintained his innocence.
Former inmate Arthur Snow Jr. filed an affidavit two weeks ago stating that Stites’ fiancé Jimmy Fennell — former Georgetown police officer who was an original person of interest — personally confessed to the murder to him years ago while they were on the prison yard together.
“Jimmy said his fiancé had been sleeping around with a Black man behind his back,” Snow wrote. “Toward the end of the conversation Jimmy said confidently, ‘I had to kill my nigger-loving fiancé.'”
Snow further added that his impression of Jimmy was that he felt safe and proud to share that information with him because he was a member of the Aryan Brotherhood and would earn him credibility within the supremacist gang.
American journalist and civil rights activist Shaun King was one many high profile figures who spearheaded this fight to stop the execution of Reed helping to rally over three million signatures on a #FreeRodneyReed website and petition that he launched a few weeks ago.
According to King’s newsletter, he helped to set up 100,000 total calls to lawmakers and successfully pressured 70 Texas legislators, including Republican Senator Ted Cruz, to write letters urging the governor to intervene. He also helped volunteers to organize more than 130 vigils and rallies throughout the nation recruiting 4,000 people to join in the process.
Following the news of Reed’s stay of execution, reality-star-turned-criminal-justice-advocate Kim Kardashian West visited the death row inmate, according to TMZ.
“Today, I had the honor of meeting Rodney Reed in person and the privilege of sitting with him when he got the news that the highest court in Texas had issued a stay of execution and remanded the case back to the trial court for further consideration,” Kardashian posted on Instagram.
It’s unclear when Reed’s new trial will be but many are hoping for his case to ultimately be overturned.
