‘Donor’ father can assert parental rights

No Conflict for Board Vote on Permit

By Deborah Elkins
Published: April 23, 2013
Tags: Justice William C. Mims, Municipal, Supreme Court of Virginia

Two members of the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors who also held director positions with the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority did not have conflicts of interest that precluded them from voting on WMATA’s application for a special exception to build a bus maintenance facility near appellant Newberry Station neighborhood, and the Supreme Court of [...]

Firearms Statute Allows Proof of Multiple Priors

By Deborah Elkins
Published: April 23, 2013
Tags: Criminal, Justice William C. Mims, Supreme Court of Virginia

Although a Virginia statute prohibits firearm possession by a person “previously convicted of a violent felony,” the trial court did not err in allowing proof of five prior convictions to prove the possession offense, and the Supreme Court of Virginia affirms defendant’s conviction under Va. Code § 18.2-308.2(A). Where the existence of one or more [...]

Phone Call Did Not Violate Ethics Rule

By Deborah Elkins
Published: March 13, 2013
Tags: Attorneys, Justice William C. Mims, Supreme Court of Virginia

A lawyer defending a med-mal case did not violate Rule 4.2 of the Virginia Rules of Professional Conduct when she failed to immediately hang up on the plaintiff who began telling the lawyer the case was taking an emotional toll on the family and they wanted to settle; a unanimous Supreme Court of Virginia reverses [...]

Sealing Exhibits in Criminal Case Was Error

By Deborah Elkins
Published: March 11, 2013
Tags: Civil Rights, Justice William C. Mims, Supreme Court of Virginia

Sealing exhibits from a court file of a woman’s prosecution for the felony child neglect and second-degree murder of her two children violated constitutional and statutory provisions establishing a presumption of open court records, and the Supreme Court of Virginia vacates the court’s sealing order. Although the order to seal the court records has expired, [...]

Short call was not misconduct

By Peter Vieth
Published: February 28, 2013
Tags: Justice William C. Mims, Lawyer Discipline, Supreme Court of Virginia News, Virginia State Bar

A lawyer who took a telephone call from a distraught adversary did not violate the bar’s ethics rules when she did not immediately hang up, the Supreme Court of Virginia has ruled. The court’s decision clears the record for Heather E. Zaug of Fairfax who received a “dismissal de minimis” for her phone conversation with [...]

‘Donor’ Father May Assert Parental Rights

By Deborah Elkins
Published: January 17, 2013
Tags: Domestic Relations, Justice William C. Mims, Supreme Court of Virginia

A man who fathered a child with his girlfriend through in vitro fertilization can assert his parental rights, despite a Virginia statute that declares that a sperm “donor” can only be recognized as the father of a child born through assisted conception if the father is married to the mother; the Virginia Supreme Court says [...]

Failure-to-warn rule tightened in van case

By Peter Vieth
Published: January 17, 2013
Tags: Justice Cleo E. Powell, Justice Donald W. Lemons, Justice Elizabeth A. McClanahan, Justice LeRoy F. Millette Jr., Justice William C. Mims, Products Liability, Supreme Court of Virginia News, Virginia Association of Defense Attorneys, Wrongful Death

A change of heart by a single justice has brought an end to a short-lived “relaxed” standard for failure-to-warn claims under Virginia products liability law. After rehearing a products liability case, Virginia Supreme Court Justice LeRoy F. Millette Jr. switched his position on the standard for use of similar incidents in product failure cases, dashing [...]

Double Death Penalty Upheld

By Deborah Elkins
Published: January 15, 2013
Tags: Criminal, Justice William C. Mims, Supreme Court of Virginia

The Supreme Court of Virginia upholds the capital murder conviction and two death sentences for Mark Lawlor, a former leasing agent for an apartment complex who used a master key to gain access to a woman’s apartment and assaulted and murdered her. We consider whether the circuit court erred when it 1) limited questioning during [...]

‘One-minute phone call’ subject of ethics appeal

By Deborah Elkins
Published: January 11, 2013
Tags: Justice Donald W. Lemons, Justice William C. Mims, Lawyer Discipline, Supreme Court of Virginia News, Virginia State Bar

Imagine walking around in another person’s skin, in order to understand him. Atticus Finch gave that advice to his daughter Scout, and it may have been on the minds of Virginia’s Supreme Court justices when they heard a trio of lawyer discipline cases last week. When a Virginia State Bar complaint comes before the court, [...]