Those wrongfully convicted of a crime would be compensated under a new bill that passed the Senate Judiciary panel today.

Republican State Senator Robin Webb sponsored Senate Bill 131.

She told lawmakers, since 1989, there have been 23 known exonerations with wrongfully convicted Kentuckians serving a combined 220 years.

One of those exonerees whose conviction was overturned with the help of the Kentucky Innocence Project, spoke at today's hearing.

When you take 27 years as a convicted felon and the end result is, oops, we're sorry, it doesn't sit right with anyone.

If anyone if anyone in this room was there, experienced the same thing, you would be saying, there's a lot of zero Smith and a half of these numbers.

An incredible experience, certainly deserving of some compensation.

We can't quantify what Mike and other individuals have lost, but certainly I think the state can allow a threshold.

You know, he's he was released with no assistance whatsoever.

Just turned back into society with no reentry.

Services.

You know, that that would maybe so this bill would also address that to some degree.

But we have with the technology that we have now.

And I, since I've been in the general Assembly, we made great strides with DNA.

We're trying to upgrade our labs.

We're trying to do all those things.

So the pool of wrongful convictions in a perfect world is going to dwindle.

Committee members were told of the 23 recognized exonerations in Kentucky.

Eight reached civil settlements for their wrongful conviction, leaving 15 who could apply for compensation under the bill.

It's expected that $7.5 million would go to that group based on the time served average compensation for any future exonerations would be between 100,000 and $650,000.

Senator Webb said the state could save money since most of the civil settlements in wrongful conviction cases have exceeded the compensation amount awarded under the bill.