Reality star to pay former prisoner’s rent

Kim Kardashian West has once again come to a former prisoner’s rescue.

Matthew Charles, one of the first inmates released under the First Step Act, the criminal-justice reform law that Kardashian West had championed, will live rent-free for the next five years thanks to the reality TV star, who agreed to foot the bill after learning about Charles’ difficulty finding a home of his own due to his criminal record.

Charles, 53, was one of President Donald Trump’s guests at the State of the Union in February, a little more than a month after he was released from prison after serving more than two decades of a 35-year sentence for a nonviolent drug offense. Kardashian, who has frequented the White House to lobby Trump for sentencing reform, brought Charles’ case to the president during her visits.

“Kim did not do this for attention or publicity, but I had to share it, because it’s to good not to, and my heart is about to burst with happiness, that I wish you to rejoice in this news with me,” Charles wrote on his personal Facebook page late Sunday night.

Since taking up the case of Alice Marie Johnson, a 63-year-old grandmother who was sentenced to life for a nonviolent drug offense, Kardashian West has remained a fixture on the criminal justice reform circuit. She helped secure Johnson’s freedom, was involved in the case of Cyntoia Brown, who was also granted clemency, and advocated for the First Step Act, which reduces federally mandated minimum sentences.

EVAN AGOSTINI/INVISION Kim Kardashian West offered financial assistance to Matthew Charles, who was in prison for over 20 years.