The Alabama House has given final passage to a bill that would expand the list of crimes for which a judge can hold a person in jail without bail.

The bill is a proposed constitutional amendment and now goes to the ballot for voters, who will have the final say on whether it becomes law.

SB118 by Sen. Will Barfoot, R-Montgomery, would expand Aniah’s Law, which lawmakers passed in 2021 in response to the kidnapping and murder of Aniah Blanchard.

Blanchard, a 19-year-old college student from Homewood, was abducted from a convenience store in Auburn in October 2019. A month later, authorities found her body in rural Macon County.

The man charged in Blanchard’s murder had been released on bail after being charged with kidnapping, robbery and attempted murder after an incident that happened in January 2019.

Before Aniah’s Law, the Alabama Constitution said people charged with a crime had a right to a reasonable bail unless they were charged with a capital crime.

Aniah’s law expanded that exception to the right to bail to include murder (non-capital), as well as first-degree kidnapping, rape, sodomy, sexual torture, domestic violence, human trafficking, burglary, arson, robbery, terrorism, and aggravated abuse of a child under age 6.

The law does not automatically deny bail for people charged with those crimes, but gave judges the authority to deny bail after a hearing.

Barfoot’s bill would add to the list of crimes for which a judge could deny bail:

• Solicitation, attempt, or conspiracy to commit murder
• Firing a gun into an occupied dwelling, building, railroad locomotive, railroad car, aircraft, automobile, truck, or watercraft.

If the bill passes the Legislature, it would go on the ballot for voters to approve as an amendment to the state constitution.

Alabama voters approved Aniah’s Law by a wide margin in November 2022.

The House passed Barfoot’s bill 87-0. It had passed the Senate 29-0 back in February.