ATLANTA (AP) — A repeated attempt to fix Georgia’s inefficient system for compensating people wrongfully convicted of crimes almost died. Then it got tacked onto a bill that could compensate former President Donald Trump and his codefendants for attorneys’ fees after they were indicted for attempting to overturn his 2020 election loss in Georgia.

The combined bill, Senate Bill 244, won final approval Friday, the last day of Georgia’s legislative session.

If Republican Gov. Brian Kemp signs the bill, it would let criminal defendants recoup attorneys’ fees in cases where a prosecutor gets disqualified and the case is dismissed. It would also establish a state law requiring an administrative law judge to award $75,000 per year of incarceration to people who have been found wrongfully convicted if they prove they are innocent of the crime or any lesser offense.

Georgia is one of 12 states without a law compensating people wrongfully convicted of crimes, according to an analysis by the Georgia Innocence Project. Instead, a lawmaker must sponsor a measure to compensate people and get legislative approval — a process plagued by politics that often leaves people without money, including five who tried this year.

The original half of the bill has a different backstory. Trump and 18 codefendants were indicted in Fulton County in August 2023. Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis was disqualified from the case by a state appeals court based on a romantic relationship she had with special prosecutor Nathan Wade, whom Willis hired to lead the case.

This is what led state Sen. Brandon Beach, an Alpharetta Republican, to bring forward the measure. He was recently named treasurer of the United States by Trump after years of vociferous support for the president.

“Punitive politics”

The measure passed the Senate 35-18 with all Republicans voting yes. The three highest-ranking Democrats crossed over to vote yes — House Minority Leader Harold Jones II of Augusta House Democratic Caucus Chair Sen. Elena Parent of Atlanta and House Democratic Whip Kim Jackson of Stone Mountain.

But many Democrats were not on board.

“I understand some people have allegiance to the president and some people voted for him, and that’s their right. But do not force my constituents to pay his legal fees,” Atlanta Democrat state Sen. RaShaun Kemp said.

Atlanta Democrat state Rep. Shea Roberts on Wednesday called the bill a “disgusting display of punitive politics.” The bill passed 103-61 in the House.

“It puts legislators and voters in a moral straitjacket,” Roberts said. “If you want to support justice for the wrongfully convicted, you also have to support protecting powerful politicians from accountability. That’s not leadership, that’s hostage-taking.”

A long-standing push

The bill’s passage came the day after Republican Senate Majority Whip Randy Robertson held a four hour committee meeting at 6 a.m. on a measure to compensate five people whose convictions were overturned after years of incarceration. By then, it was too late for that proposal to get a vote.

Robertson, a former sheriff’s deputy, has been the lead opponent against past measures to compensate people and to establish a law to let legal experts make that decision instead of legislators.

People seeking compensation this year have had convictions overturned based on findings such as DNA evidence, legal and police errors and the discovery of new evidence indicating they did not commit the crime they were incarcerated for.

But Robertson said people set free due to wrongful convictions aren’t necessarily innocent because convictions may be overturned due to technical errors. He also had doubts about whether some of the people seeking compensation this year were innocent. Still, he said the current method is flawed, and he decided to support this year’s bill to take the compensation process out of the legislature’s hand.

Republican sponsor state Rep. Katie Dempsey of Rome said the bill will let the wrongfully convicted “have a true chance, that is not a retrial from legislators.”

Democratic Rep. Scott Holcomb, who has championed the wrongful compensation bill for years, begged Democrats in both chambers to vote for a measure he called one of the few “incredibly consequential” bills he worked on.

“There isn’t a person alive who would trade the money that these individuals are receiving for what happened to them in terms of being locked up in our state’s prisons, for usually decades of their lives, for something they didn’t do,” he said Friday.

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Associated Press reporter Jeff Amy contributed.

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Charlotte Kramon is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues. Follow Kramon on X: @charlottekramon.