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n JACKSON - The Mississippi Senate wants to make it more difficult for convicts to get out of prison after the recent parole and pardon of convicted murderers.
A bill approved Thursday in the Senate would require the governor to hold a public hearing before exercising a pardon.
The bill also would require a unanimous vote by the five-member state Parole Board to release anyone convicted of capital murder or a sex crime.
The changes came in response to the recent parole of Douglas Hodgkin, who was convicted of capital murder in 1987 for the death of a college student and her unborn child; and the suspended sentence last year of Michael David Graham, a Gulf Coast man who stalked and killed his ex-wife in 1989.