Penal Law § 20.05

Criminal liability for conduct of another; no defense · as in force on May 31, 2026

§ 20.05 Criminal liability for conduct of another; no defense.

In any prosecution for an offense in which the criminal liability of the defendant is based upon the conduct of another person pursuant to section 20.00, it is no defense that:

1. Such other person is not guilty of the offense in question owing to criminal irresponsibility or other legal incapacity or exemption, or to unawareness of the criminal nature of the conduct in question or of the defendant's criminal purpose or to other factors precluding the mental state required for the commission of the offense in question; or

2. Such other person has not been prosecuted for or convicted of any offense based upon the conduct in question, or has previously been acquitted thereof, or has legal immunity from prosecution therefor; or

3. The offense in question, as defined, can be committed only by a particular class or classes of persons, and the defendant, not belonging to such class or classes, is for that reason legally incapable of committing the offense in an individual capacity.

Official sourcehttps://www.nysenate.gov/legislation/laws/PEN/20.05

In plain English

When liability rests on someone else's conduct (§ 20.00), these are not defenses:

(1) The other person is not guilty because of incapacity, an exemption, not knowing the conduct was criminal, or lacking the required mental state.
(2) The other person was never prosecuted or convicted, was acquitted, or has immunity. ★
(3) The offense can only be committed by a certain class of persons, and the defendant is not in that class.

Marked in the text: penalties, time limits, sums of money. Editorial emphasis added by this edition; it does not appear in the statute as enacted.

In print

This provision appears in Volume 4 — The Court Clerk: Penal Law; Volume 1 — The Court Officer in Plain English; Volume 3 — The Court Officer: Penal Law; Volume 3 — Your Career: Penal Law in Plain English.