Addabbo and Miller introduce anti-harassment bills

From the Queens Gazette:

The state senate last week approved a measure introduced by state Senator Joe Addabbo Jr. that would make it a crime to use a government agency to harass an individual by making false claims to officials.

“Sometimes disagreements among community residents can rise to the level where one person falsely accuses another of wrongdoing and reports the alleged misdeeds to a government agency, simply to cause their neighbor grief,” Addabbo said in a prepared statement.

“This kind of harassment not only seriously hurts the person who is wrongfully accused but leads to a waste of government resources and precious time that various agency inspectors could devote to actual violations of the law,” Addabbo declared.

The bill was prompted by complaints made to Addabbo’s office and would allow authorities to charge a false reporter with second-degree aggravated harassment, a class A misdemeanor.

Addabbo said a similar bill sponsored by Assemblymember Mike Miller is under consideration by the state Assembly.

Photo from Project Woodhaven