Former State Senator Carl Kruger resigned, pleaded guilty to corruption charges, and has cleared out of his district’s office. But under current ethics law, he is still eligible for a state pension.

The Times Union’s Jimmy Vielkind estimated that Kruger will get about $69,534.61 per year under the pension scheme because a pension claw-back provision in the new ethics law passed earlier this year doesn’t apply to public servants who had been employed by the state prior to the enactment of the law on November 13, according to Eric Sumberg, press secretary of the State Comptroller. They “would not have their pensions taken away,” said Sumberg. “If you are a member of the system, and all state legislators are, you are entitled to a pension.”

Given that New York State has had 18 state legislators leave office or lose re-election since 1999 after getting into legal trouble, we want to know: How much has the state been paying to such disgraced lawmakers who’ve been eligible for pensions?

If you have information or insights to share, please comment below, write us, or tweet to @thenyworld.

What we found

New York State has paid at least $2.6 million in pension checks to 12 of the 18 ex-legislators who have been embroiled in criminal cases  — some of whom are still sitting in jail — with the largest accumulated amount, $564,210, going to former Sen. Guy Velella (see table below).

“It’s an absolute outrage. They should have their pensions stripped if they’re convicted,” said State Senator David Carlucci (D-Clarkstown, Rockland County), who had earlier called for Kruger to forfeit his pension. Today he told the World that he wanted to see all of Kruger’s kind, including the dozen named below, voluntarily give up their pension checks.

Carlucci had been a strong supporter behind the ethics reform bill, and said it was “troubling and very unfortunate” that New York has to still pay for these lawbreaking lawmakers. “But it was the way to get this bill passed,” he added. “At least we can look forward.”The Office of State Comptroller provided us with gross monthly pension payments to each ex-legislator, which are not exact detailed figures — they leave out details like cost-of-living adjustments — but do give a pretty accurate picture of what each receives.

We took those monthly amounts and multiplied them by the number of complete months between the date of retirement and today — or the date of death, for the two (Velella and former State Sen. Anthony Seminerio) who died in January 2011.

Family members can continue to collect pension payments after a lawmaker’s death through the Survivor’s Benefit Program and other vehicles, depending on which pension plan the lawmaker participated in. Because the Comptroller doesn’t release that information, our calculations do not include death benefits.

Since it’s extremely unlikely that the ex-legislators named below would willingly give up their pensions, David Grandeau, former executive director of the State Commission on Lobbying, suggests finding alternative ways of recapturing funds. “One creative solution would be state to go after compensation from this convicted felons equal to the amount they stole from state of New York – the salaries they collected while paying bribes and committing their crimes,” he suggested. “They ought to be made to pay back somehow.”

As for the remaining legislators among the 18, the Office of State Comptroller has not received retirement applications from Carl Kruger, John Sabini, Michael Cole, Ryan Karben, or Roger Green. Hiram Monserrate retired from the New York City police force and is therefore not eligible to join New York State and Local Retirement System unless he suspends his police pension.