Woman thanks Trump for 'mercy' in commuting her sentence

Johnson will be released from federal prison in Aliceville, Ala., where she has been serving her time since 1996.

The great-grandmother's emotional homecoming came after Kim Kardashian West lobbied for President Trump to commute her life sentence, which advocates said was an exorbitant sentence given Johnson's lack of criminal history and the nature of the crime.

A lawyer for Kim Kardashian West is describing the moment Alice Marie Johnson found out President Donald Trump had commuted her sentence.

Kardashian West visited the White House in May to meet with Jared Kushner, Trump's son-in-law and senior adviser, who is overseeing the administration's push to overhaul the nation's prison system.

In an interview with Mic released earlier this year, Kardashian West said she'd been moved by Johnson's story after seeing a video by the news outlet on Twitter. Though Johnson said she feels she overpaid her debt for the crime that she committed, she refuses to focus on the past.

Last week, Trump pardoned firebrand conservative commentator Dinesh D'Souza, who was convicted of violating campaign finance laws. It was her first conviction.

WVTM-TV in Birmingham, Alabama, later showed pictures of Johnson shortly after her release, running in happiness from a van towards family members holding flowers and waiting for her beside the road. "This moment right now is happening because President Trump had mercy on me", she said.

Jack Johnson received a rare posthumous pardon last month, after another actor - Sylvester Stallone of Rocky fame - championed his case. "I'm free to hug my family".

In a statement announcing the president's decision, the White House said Johnson "has accepted responsibility for her past behavior" and has been a model prisoner, working hard to rehabilitate herself and serve as a mentor to fellow inmates.

Johnson has a job lined up as an administrative assistant in a dental office, but she said she'll keep pushing for sentencing reform for nonviolent first-time offenders who don't pose a threat to their communities.

The celebrity daughter of a defense lawyer - Robert Kardashian, who represented O.J. Simpson in his 1995 murder trial - Kardashian West brought her own high-powered lawyer to the White House Wednesday.

Ivanka Trump was one of the first people she called to plead Johnson's case, Kardashian said.

"I'd like to tell President Trump that I am so grateful for everything that you've done for me and my family", Alice Johnson, 63, said Thursday on "Good Morning America". "She told me that she knew that this was meant to be", Johnson said. Prosecutors opposed a pending reduction in her sentence, citing federal guidelines based on the large quantity of drugs involved. Others, including White House counsel Don McGahn and chief of staff John Kelly, were less enthusiastic, according to a senior administration official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.

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