Penal Law § 270.20 · Article 270. Other Offenses Relating to Public Safety
Unlawful wearing of body armor
Text — Law content up to date as of October 23, 2026, as published by the New York State Senate (Open Legislation)
§ 270.20 Unlawful wearing of body armor.
1. A person is guilty of the unlawful wearing of body armor when acting either alone or with one or more other persons he commits any violent felony offense defined in section 70.02 while possessing a firearm, rifle or shotgun and in the course of and in furtherance of such crime he or she wears body armor.
2. For the purposes of this section "body armor" means any product that is a personal protective body covering intended to protect against gunfire, regardless of whether such product is to be worn alone or is sold as a complement to another product or garment.
The unlawful wearing of body armor is a class E felony.
Source of truth
- Edition
- Law content up to date as of October 23, 2026, as published by the New York State Senate (Open Legislation)
- Official file
- https://legislation.nysenate.gov/pdf/laws/PEN270.20
- Text hash
- sha256 38a56d5edae832649480dab74194a4933065e3a54b8f394e9fcd5e44a7371c53
- Composed by
- gen_ny_statutes.py 2026-11-10: the Senate's Open Legislation law tree (GET /api/3/laws/<ID>?full=true) read in document order; the Senate's PDF of the whole law (GET /pdf/laws/<ID>?full=true), read with PDFium, prints the same words in the same order
Procedural information only. Not legal advice and not a substitute for the advice of an attorney. Confirm the current text with the official publisher before relying on it.