New York Laws
Article 8 - Officers; General Provisions
405 - Procedure When New Officer Assumes Duties of Office.

§ 405. Procedure when new officer assumes duties of office. 1. When a
newly elected or appointed county officer has qualified by taking and
filing the official oath and undertaking required of him by law, the
certificate furnished by the county clerk pursuant to section four
hundred shall be his authority to demand of his predecessor the custody
of all books, records, maps, papers, equipment, supplies, moneys and
property of the county to which such officer is entitled and directed to
have custody. Such inventories, statements or receipts, as may be
required of such officer by local law or by resolution of the board of
supervisors, shall be given. If the outgoing officer shall have died,
the administrator or executor of his estate may also demand a receipt of
the successor in office.

2. The outgoing sheriff, or the officer acting as sheriff, shall
deliver the custody of all prisoners confined in the jail, together with
all books, records, process, mandates, commitments and other papers
pertaining to the office, to the new sheriff and duplicate receipts
shall be given therefor. Uncompleted property executions and executions
directed against wages, earnings or income of a judgment-debtor shall be
delivered to the new sheriff.

3. The failure of any outgoing officer to deliver such custody within
ten days after such certificate has been delivered and a demand made
thereon, shall entitle the successor in office to maintain an action in
the name of the county against said predecessor in office, or the
administrator or executor of his estate, or against any employee or
other person having possession thereof, to obtain such custody and to
recover any damages that may have been suffered by the county by reason
of such detention, together with a penalty of five hundred dollars. The
county attorney shall appear for such county officer suing on behalf of
the county and the recovery together with the statutory costs shall be
the property of the county and may be used for general county purposes.