BATON ROUGE - A bill to allow the legislature to create a joint committee of members of both the House and Senate to decide whether a judge should be impeached after a violation is heading to the governor's desk.

Three-fifths of a vote by both the State Senate and House of Representatives is what it would take for the legislature to recommend a judge for an impeachment investigation, after a sworn complaint filed by a citizen alleges some sort of violation, like malfeasance, gross misconduct, or incompetence, while serving on the bench.

Author of the bill, Senator Jay Morris, says he brought it forth so that citizens have a voice when a judge fails to do their job.

"We need it now because the failings of the judiciary have resulted in multiple unnecessary deaths of innocent people, including at the Mall of Louisiana, including in Shreveport, including Jacob Carter," Morris said during the House and Governmental Affairs committee meeting last month.

State Representative Tony Bacala says that with the judiciary council being a separate section of the state constitution, there has been some confusion about whether judges should be held accountable the same way as other elected officials.

"We clarified in this legislation that judges are not special. They, too, can be impeached," Bacala said.

But some say there is already a judicial commission in place that handles violations made by judges.

"If the judiciary committee makes a decision and removes them from office, they can also lose their law license. Not sure why putting another tribunal in place that's not qualified, not trained to conduct these types of proceedings, is going to be empowered by the legislature, by the way, is the legislature, to do this," Legal Analyst Franz Borghardt said.

Borghardt says if the legislature were to get this type of authority, it would create a separation of powers issue.

"A judge that commits a crime can be prosecuted. They can be arrested. A judge that commits malfeasance they can be arrested. The judiciary commission is best qualified to do this test," Borghardt said.

If this bill is signed by the governor, it would still need a constitutional amendment approved by voters to go into effect.