The Legislature is trying to update the state’s criminal laws. A committee of senators and house members began eight weeks of meetings on October 2, 2012 to sift through a piece of legislation that is more than 1,000 pages long. Senator Jolie Justus of Kansas City, who is co-chair of the committee, says county prosecutors and public defenders spent more than five years going over the state’s current criminal laws and came up with the framework for the bill. Justus says the last time the state’s criminal code was updated was in the early 1970’s.