The Virginia Appellate Lawyer’s Court of Appeals of Virginia Blog

In the Virginia Mercury today, Ned Oliver reports that Attorney General Jason Miyares wants 75 new positions to handle an “unexpected” upturn in criminal appeals to the Court of Appeals under the appeal of right law.  Under the new law, the AG’s office represents the Commonwealth in all criminal appeals.  In January, 300 appeals were assigned to the Criminal Appellate Division — this includes both appeals that were pending at the writ stage on January 1 and newly filed appeal

Elwin Charles “Preacher” Roe was a baseball player from Ash Flat, Arkansas.  His major league career spanned 16 years in the mid-20th century, excepting a few years in the middle when he served is the armed forces during the Second World War and, though he was a five time All-Star pitcher, he is mainly remembered these days — if not by name, at least by the repetition of the quote — for a bit of homespun wisdom he offered to a sports reporter after being removed as starting p

The last two weeks have seen the Court of Appeals release four published decisions – two by opinion and two by order – that perhaps give a hint of things to come as the Court enters into its new era of hearing criminal appeals of right.  All four cases were criminal matter and decided “against” the appealing defendant . . . sort of. Let’s begin with the two opinions, which were decidedly in favor of the Commonwealth.  Lucas Edward Ritchie v. Commonwealth of Virginia deals wit

Time for another rant.  Yesterday, NASA announced that it was having to delay its first test mission for the planned return to the moon.  On social media and news comment threads, the comments were mostly negative, with many calling for NASA to be defunded as a “waste of taxpayer money.”  I particular liked the comments that focused how projects like this were “what you get when you elect democrats” and “we need Trump back to kill” wasteful programs.  (Editor’s note: these ar

In hopefully what is not a sign of things to come, the first month of the New Year passed without a single granted appeal from the Supreme Court of Virginia. This is not unusual.  Last year the court did not grant an appeal until February 9, and that was the only grant that month. But the Court only granted 6 cases in December following the last writ panel of 2021. The Court will already be facing a dwindling supply of potential cases while the Court of Appeals grows accustom

Today’s lone published opinion from the Court of Appeals, Dwayne Allen Ray, Jr. v. Commonwealth of Virginia, has a certain dramatic “Law and Order” feel to it.  It also calls to mind a tune by Queen that starts with an iconic bass line.  Mostly, however, it evokes the aged old debate of whether there is honor among thieves, or in this case, drug dealers. We’ve all seen an episode of a police procedural drama where the police “flip” one suspect to get incriminating evidence on