AB242: Text as Enrolled

* Section 991.11, Wisconsin Statutes: Effective date of acts. “Every act and every portion of an act enacted by the legislature over the governor's partial veto which does not expressly prescribe the time when it takes effect shall take effect on the day after its date of publication.”

  Date of enactment:
2025 Assembly Bill 242   Date of publication*:

2025 WISCONSIN ACT

An Act to amend 941.40 (1), 941.40 (2), 941.40 (3) and 941.40 (4) (b) of the statutes; relating to: tampering with telecommunication or electric wires and providing a penalty.

The people of the state of Wisconsin, represented in senate and assembly, do enact as follows:

AB242,1 Section 1. 941.40 (1) of the statutes is amended to read:

941.40 (1) Except as provided under sub. (4), any person having the right so to do who intentionally removes or changes any building or other structure or any timber, standing or fallen, to which any telegraph, telecommunications, video service, broadband service, wireless service, electric light, or electric power lines or wires are in any manner attached, or causes the same to be done, and consequently destroys, disturbs, or injures the wires, poles, or other property of any telegraph, telecommunications, video service, broadband service, wireless service, electric light, or electric power company, including a cooperative association organized under ch. 185, transacting business in this state, without first giving the company, at its office nearest the place of injury, at least 24 hours’ notice thereof, is guilty of a Class B misdemeanor.

AB242,2 Section 2. 941.40 (2) of the statutes is amended to read:

941.40 (2) Any person who intentionally breaks down, interrupts, or removes any telegraph, telecommunications, video service, broadband service, wireless service, electric light, or electric power line or wire including grounds or who destroys, disturbs, interferes with, or injures the wires, poles, or other property of any telegraph, telecommunications, video service, broadband service, wireless service, electric light, or electric power company, including a cooperative association organized under ch. 185, is guilty of a Class B misdemeanor I felony.

AB242,3 Section 3. 941.40 (3) of the statutes is amended to read:

941.40 (3) Any person who, for any purpose, intentionally makes or causes to be made a physical electrical connection with any wire, cable, conductor, ground, equipment, facility, or other property of any telegraph, telecommunications, video service, broadband service, wireless service, electric light, or electric power company, including a cooperative association organized under ch. 185, is guilty of a Class A misdemeanor I felony.

AB242,4 Section 4. 941.40 (4) (b) of the statutes is amended to read:

941.40 (4) (b) Subsections (2) and (3) do not apply to a person who acts with the permission of the telegraph, telecommunications, video service, broadband service, wireless service, electric light, or electric power company, including a cooperative association organized under ch. 185, that owns the wire, pole, cable, conductor, ground, equipment, facility, or other property.