A federal court rules in favor of allowing U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara to seize the pension of a former state lawmaker convicted of corruption.
The second circuit ruled that former Assemblyman Eric Stevenson can lose his state pension of about $22,000, to be used as forfeiture.
Pensions of public employees are protected by the state constitution as property, even though Stevenson was not in the Assembly long enough to be vested.
The court found that federal law supersedes state law.
Albany lawmakers have begun the process of changing the constitution to allow public officials convicted of a crime to be stripped of their pensions.
The earliest it could go to voters in a referendum is 2018.