New York Senate Bill S03831

New York 2025-2026 Regular Session

• Introduced: 1/30/25
• Refer: 1/30/25
• Engrossed: 4/24/25
• Refer: 4/24/25

Caption

Relates to removing the ten year time period from the crime of persistent sexual abuse.

Summary

S03831 amends New York’s penal law to change the offense of persistent sexual abuse. Under current law, a person can be charged with persistent sexual abuse when they commit certain sexual offenses and have two or more prior qualifying convictions within the previous ten years, excluding time spent incarcerated. This bill removes that ten-year lookback period, so the prior convictions needed to establish the offense would no longer have to fall within a specific time window. The bill keeps the underlying conduct and penalty structure the same: persistent sexual abuse remains a class E felony, and the offense still applies to repeated convictions for forcible touching, sexual abuse in the second degree, sexual abuse in the third degree, and related offenses in Article 130. The practical effect is to broaden the reach of the statute by allowing older prior convictions to count toward the repeat-offender threshold.

Impact

This bill would amend Penal Law section 130.53 by deleting the statutory language that limits qualifying prior convictions to those occurring within the previous ten years. As a result, prosecutors could rely on older prior convictions, regardless of when they occurred, so long as they meet the other requirements of separate criminal transactions and separate sentencing occasions. The change would expand the pool of defendants eligible for prosecution under the persistent sexual abuse statute and could increase the number of cases charged as class E felonies.

Sentiment

The available voting history shows strong support for the bill. It passed the Senate Codes Committee unanimously, 13-0, and later passed the Senate floor unanimously, 51-0. No committee transcript or recorded debate was provided, but the unanimous votes suggest broad agreement that the bill is a targeted public-safety measure aimed at strengthening repeat-offender accountability in sexual offense cases.

Contention

No explicit opposition is reflected in the provided materials, but the main policy issue is the removal of the ten-year limitation. Supporters likely view this as closing a loophole that can prevent older but relevant prior convictions from being used, while potential critics could argue that eliminating the time limit reduces the statute’s limiting principle and may capture conduct too remote in time. The bill does not change the underlying offenses or felony class, so the contention is focused on how far back prior convictions should count.