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SACRAMENTO (AP) — Female inmates serving life sentences could get overnight visits with their children under a bill approved Tuesday by the California Assembly. 

Currently, the state Department of Corrections allows overnight family visits inside prison walls for inmates who have been given parole dates. 

The bill would also allow women serving life terms with possibility of parole but without release dates to have the overnight visits with their children under 21. 

A backer, Assemblywoman Carole Migden, D-San Francisco, said the bill would strengthen families, reduce recidivism and allow children to interact with their mothers. 

Opponents said it would cause security problems at prisons. 

And Assemblyman Phil Wyman, R-Tehachapi, said the visits would be bad for “children who do not want to see their mother who might have killed their father or several other persons.”