STATE OF NEW YORK
________________________________________________________________________
6795
2019-2020 Regular Sessions
IN ASSEMBLY
March 20, 2019
___________
Introduced by M. of A. CRUZ -- read once and referred to the Committee
on Codes
AN ACT to amend the penal law, in relation to wage theft
The People of the State of New York, represented in Senate and Assem-bly, do enact as follows:
1 Section 1. Subdivision 1 of section 155.00 of the penal law, as
2 amended by chapter 514 of the laws of 1986, is amended and a new subdi-
3 vision 10 is added to read as follows:
4 1. "Property" means any money, wages, personal property, real proper-
5 ty, computer data, computer program, thing in action, evidence of debt
6 or contract, or any article, substance or thing of value, including any
7 gas, steam, water or electricity, which is provided for a charge or
8 compensation.
9 10. "Workforce" means a group of one or more people providing services
10 in exchange for wages for one person or entity.
11 § 2. Subdivision 2 of section 155.05 of the penal law is amended by
12 adding a new paragraph (f) to read as follows:
13 (f) By wage theft.
14 A person obtains property by wage theft when he agrees to hire a
15 person to perform services and the person performs such services and the
16 defendant withholds such wages from said person. In a prosecution for
17 wage theft, for the purposes of venue, it is permissible to aggregate
18 all takings from one person from one defendant, into one larceny count,
19 even if the takings occurred in multiple counties. It is also permissi-
20 ble to aggregate takings from a workforce into one larceny count.
21 § 3. This act shall take effect immediately.
EXPLANATION--Matter in italics (underscored) is new; matter in brackets
[] is old law to be omitted.
LBD09504-01-9
