---
type: "Bill"
title: "Relief of Clifford Williams by the State of Florida"
description: "Relief of Clifford Williams by the State of Florida; Providing for the relief of Clifford Williams; providing an appropriation to compensate him for being wrongfully incarcerated for 43 years; directing the Chief Financial Officer to draw a warrant payable to an irrevocable trust for the benefit of Clifford Williams; providing that the act does not waive certain defenses or increase the state’s limits of liability; providing that certain benefits are vacated upon specified findings, etc."
jurisdiction: "us/states/fl"
legislature: "Florida Legislature"
session: "2020"
identifier: "SB 28"
citation: "Florida SB 28 (2020)"
classification: ["bill"]
subjects: ["(claims bills)"]
status: "enacted"
primary_sponsors: ["Gibson"]
version_count: 3
action_count: 31
vote_count: 5
first_action: "2019-08-01"
last_action: "2020-06-09"
source: "openstates"
source_identifier: "ocd-bill/9f3baba1-25ac-42ec-96ba-d70227170f21"
source_url: "http://flsenate.gov/Session/Bill/2020/28/ByCategory"
source_hash: "5af0c6078e120abb3d1ec0a77c6e36072775d4c1150e31ff505e0430a7fa2e36"
vintage: "2026-07-01"
source_snapshot: "https://data.openstates.org/daily/2026-07-01/public.pgdump"
retrieved_at: "2026-07-06"
confidence: "reported"
tags: ["legislation", "bill", "us-fl"]
---

# Florida SB 28 (2020) — Relief of Clifford Williams by the State of Florida

Relief of Clifford Williams by the State of Florida; Providing for the relief of Clifford Williams; providing an appropriation to compensate him for being wrongfully incarcerated for 43 years; directing the Chief Financial Officer to draw a warrant payable to an irrevocable trust for the benefit of Clifford Williams; providing that the act does not waive certain defenses or increase the state’s limits of liability; providing that certain benefits are vacated upon specified findings, etc.

## Version chain

The bill's text revisions, in order — the diff chain from filing to enrollment.

1. **S 28 Filed** (filed) — [source](http://flsenate.gov/Session/Bill/2020/28/BillText/Filed/HTML)
2. **S 28 e1** (engrossed) — [source](http://flsenate.gov/Session/Bill/2020/28/BillText/e1/HTML)
3. **S 28 er** (enrolled) — [source](http://flsenate.gov/Session/Bill/2020/28/BillText/er/HTML)

## Votes

- Favorable — **8–0** (pass) · upper
- Passage, Third Reading — **116–0** (pass) · lower
- Favorable — **20–0** (pass) · upper
- Third Reading — **40–0** (pass) · upper
- Favorable — **5–0** (pass) · upper

## Sponsors

- Gibson — primary (person)

## Timeline

The legislative action history — every referral, reading, and vote.

- **2019-08-01** Filed `filing`
- **2019-08-16** Referred to Special Master on Claim Bills; Judiciary; Appropriations Subcommittee on Criminal and Civil Justice; Appropriations `referral-committee`
- **2020-01-14** Introduced `introduction`
- **2020-01-23** Report Submitted by Special Master on Claim Bills
- **2020-01-23** Now in Judiciary
- **2020-01-23** On Committee agenda-- Judiciary, 01/28/20, 4:00 pm, 110 Senate Building
- **2020-01-28** Favorable by Judiciary; YEAS 5 NAYS 0 `committee-passage-favorable`
- **2020-01-29** Now in Appropriations Subcommittee on Criminal and Civil Justice
- **2020-02-13** On Committee agenda-- Appropriations Subcommittee on Criminal and Civil Justice, 02/18/20, 1:30 pm, 37 Senate Building
- **2020-02-18** Subcommittee Recommendation: Favorable by Appropriations Subcommittee on Criminal and Civil Justice; YEAS 8 NAYS 0
- **2020-02-19** Now in Appropriations
- **2020-02-19** On Committee agenda-- Appropriations, 02/20/20, 9:00 am, 412 Knott Building
- **2020-02-20** Favorable by- Appropriations; YEAS 20 NAYS 0 `committee-passage-favorable`
- **2020-02-20** Placed on Calendar, on 2nd reading
- **2020-02-20** Placed on Special Order Calendar, 02/26/20
- **2020-02-26** Read 2nd time `reading-2`
- **2020-02-26** Placed on 3rd reading
- **2020-03-03** Read 3rd time `reading-3`
- **2020-03-03** Amendment(s) adopted (819976)
- **2020-03-03** Passed as amended; YEAS 40 NAYS 0 `passage`
- **2020-03-03** In Messages
- **2020-03-06** Referred to Calendar `referral-committee`
- **2020-03-06** Placed on Special Order Calendar, 03/09/20
- **2020-03-06** Received
- **2020-03-09** Read 2nd time `reading-2`
- **2020-03-09** Placed on 3rd reading
- **2020-03-10** Read 3rd time `reading-3`
- **2020-03-10** Passed; YEAS 116 NAYS 0 `passage`
- **2020-03-10** Ordered enrolled
- **2020-05-26** Signed by Officers and presented to Governor
- **2020-06-09** Approved by Governor `executive-signature`

## Source

OpenStates / OpenCivicData bulk snapshot [2026-07-01](https://data.openstates.org/daily/2026-07-01/public.pgdump); origin `ocd-bill/9f3baba1-25ac-42ec-96ba-d70227170f21`. Confidence: reported (aggregated from official Florida legislature records).