Marvin Frederick Cole

The case involved a dispute in a divorce proceeding over whether loans totaling $39,500 that wife Nancy Kelker claimed to have borrowed from Dr. Nancy Troike for living expenses and a catalog business qualified as marital debts subject to equitable distribution. The commissioner in chancery recommended treating the debts as marital, but the trial court rejected that recommendation, and the Court of Appeals of Virginia affirmed. The court held that the commissioner provided only conclusions without documentary evidence or specific credibility findings based on witness demeanor, while the trial court articulated reasons supported by the record showing insufficient proof of the loans' existence and marital purpose. The appeals court emphasized that absent such observations or evidence, the trial court was not required to defer to the commissioner.

family law

In Bennett v. Commonwealth, the defendant was convicted in circuit court of driving under the influence of alcohol with two prior convictions within ten years, in violation of Code § 18.2-266, following an arrest after running a red light and failing to provide an adequate breath sample. He appealed, arguing that the trial court erred by declining to rule on whether the Commonwealth complied with the implied consent procedures under Code § 18.2-268.2 (instead treating it as a jury question) and by excluding testimony from an unavailable witness that had been given in district court. The Court of Appeals of Virginia, rehearing en banc, affirmed the conviction, holding that preliminary factual questions underlying the admissibility of evidence and compliance with statutory testing requirements are for the court to decide but that the trial court's handling of the issues did not require reversal.

criminal lawprocedure

The case involved Arnold Ainley Wright, III appealing the revocation of his suspended sentence by the Chesterfield County Circuit Court. Wright had received a five-year suspended sentence in 1993, which was revoked and re-suspended in subsequent years, and in 1998 the court again revoked the sentence based on new criminal convictions. Wright argued that the trial court lacked jurisdiction because the original suspension period had expired and could not be extended through revocation orders. The Court of Appeals of Virginia affirmed the trial court's decision, holding that the revocation orders properly set new suspension periods and that statutes grant courts authority to extend suspension periods in revocation proceedings.

criminal lawprocedure

Sherwood Charlton was convicted of use of a firearm in the commission of robbery after acting as an accessory before the fact by planning and facilitating a restaurant robbery by leaving a back door open, though he claimed he did not know a firearm would be used. The Court of Appeals of Virginia affirmed the conviction. The court held that under Code § 18.2-18, accessories before the fact are liable in all respects as principals for the intended crime and its natural and probable incidental consequences, such as the use of a firearm during a robbery, citing precedents like Carter v. Commonwealth that impose shared responsibility on co-actors regardless of personal knowledge or presence.

criminal lawguns

Kelley Ann Tibbs was convicted by a jury of robbery, abduction, and capital murder, with the capital murder charge based on a killing committed in the course of a robbery under Code § 18.2-31(4). The Court of Appeals of Virginia reviewed the sufficiency of the evidence supporting the capital murder conviction after denying a challenge to the robbery conviction. The majority held that the evidence established the necessary causal connection and common criminal design between the robbery and the murder. A dissent concluded that the evidence instead supported only the hypothesis that the murder was committed to cover up a prior beating, with the robbery as an afterthought, and thus failed to prove murder in the commission of robbery.

criminal law

The case involved James Easter's appeal of his conviction for driving under the influence of alcohol (DUI), third offense, under Virginia Code § 18.2-266. Easter argued that his conviction violated double jeopardy because an officer's failure to file a required incident report led to an improper seven-day administrative license suspension, and that the Commonwealth improperly amended the charge to a third offense on de novo appeal to circuit court after he had pled guilty to a second offense in general district court under a plea agreement. The Court of Appeals of Virginia affirmed the conviction, holding that the administrative suspension was civil and remedial rather than penal, so any procedural error did not implicate double jeopardy. It further ruled that acceptance of the guilty plea to the lesser offense did not constitute an acquittal of the greater offense, and that amending the charge on appeal returned the parties to their pre-plea positions without violating due process or double jeopardy protections.

criminal lawprocedure