Court of Appeals of Virginia

The Court of Appeals of Virginia is the state's intermediate appellate court. It sits between the trial courts where cases begin and the Supreme Court of Virginia at the top of the system. The General Assembly created it, and it opened for business on January 1, 1985. For most of its history the court handled a limited menu of appeals. That changed on January 1, 2022, when a reform passed by the legislature gave the Court of Appeals broad authority to hear appeals as a matter of right in both civil and criminal cases. The court now reviews far more of what Virginia's trial judges decide than it once did.

Seventeen judges make up the Court of Appeals. They are elected by a majority vote of both houses of the General Assembly, each to an eight-year term, under the framework in Article VI of the Virginia Constitution. One of them is the chief judge and carries the administrative load for the whole court. Cases are usually heard by panels of three judges drawn from the full membership. When a question is important enough, or when a panel splits in a way that troubles the rest of the bench, the Court of Appeals can rehear a matter en banc, meaning a larger group of judges sits together on the same case.

The Court of Appeals reviews final judgments of Virginia's circuit courts, which are the trial courts of general jurisdiction. Circuit courts handle felony prosecutions, larger civil suits, divorces, and appeals coming up from the district courts beneath them. Below the circuit courts sit the general district courts and the juvenile and domestic relations district courts. Those lower courts do not send appeals straight up to the Court of Appeals. A person unhappy with a general district court result generally gets a brand new trial in circuit court first. Beyond the trial courts, the Court of Appeals hears appeals from the Virginia Workers' Compensation Commission and from certain state agency decisions under the Administrative Process Act.

One court reviews the Court of Appeals, and that is the Supreme Court of Virginia. Its review is discretionary in most instances. A losing party files a petition for appeal, and the justices decide whether to take the case. They grant only a portion of what they are asked to hear. A narrow set of matters reaches the Supreme Court by right, such as attorney discipline and appeals from the State Corporation Commission, but for the ordinary litigant the higher court's door is guarded by that petition process.

Because the Supreme Court's review is largely a matter of choice, the Court of Appeals is the last court that most litigants will ever see. When a three-judge panel issues its decision, that ruling usually settles the dispute for good. The Supreme Court may decline a petition without any explanation, and a denial leaves the Court of Appeals judgment standing. Seasoned practitioners plan around this. They treat the briefing and argument before the Court of Appeals as the last real chance to win, since the higher court will probably never take the case.

Decisions come out in two forms. Published opinions bind future panels and lower courts as precedent. Unpublished opinions resolve the case at hand but carry limited weight later on. The Court of Appeals decides many matters by unpublished order, which is why a lawyer researching Virginia law leans first on the published body of Court of Appeals opinions. The distinction matters a great deal when you try to predict how a new case will come out.

The court's structure lives in the Virginia Code. Va. Code 17.1-400 and the sections that follow establish the Court of Appeals, fix its size, and describe how it works. The 2021 legislation that expanded the court grew its bench and rewrote the list of appeals it must accept. Before that change, a defendant convicted in circuit court often had to ask permission just to be heard. Now that same defendant comes to the Court of Appeals by right.

This 2022 change moved Virginia closer to how most states run their middle courts. For decades Virginia was unusual in making many criminal appellants beg for a hearing. The expanded Court of Appeals took on that added work with a larger bench and a wider grant of right-to-appeal jurisdiction. For clients the practical effect is simple. A conviction or a civil loss in circuit court now carries a dependable path to at least one full round of appellate review before the Court of Appeals, without first persuading a judge to grant permission.

None of this involves the federal courts. The Court of Appeals is a Virginia state court, and it interprets Virginia statutes, the Virginia Constitution, and the common law of the Commonwealth. A federal question can travel a different route, and after the Supreme Court of Virginia a party may sometimes seek review in the Supreme Court of the United States. For the daily work of the Court of Appeals, the governing law is Virginia's own.

As a single statewide court, the Court of Appeals hears argument in panels that travel to several cities across the Commonwealth rather than forcing every litigant to one central courthouse. The clerk's office in Richmond keeps the records and processes the filings. Wherever a panel physically sits, it speaks for the same Court of Appeals and applies the same Virginia law. This design keeps the court reachable for parties in every corner of the state.

Understanding where the Court of Appeals sits is the starting point. The harder practical question comes next. Which judgments and orders can you actually bring here, and when must the court hear you rather than merely choosing to. That is the work of jurisdiction and the docket.

Jurisdiction is a court's power to decide a case, and the Court of Appeals draws its power from statute, chiefly Va. Code 17.1-405 and the sections around it. Two ideas organize the whole docket. Some appeals come to the court by right, which means the judges must hear them once the paperwork is filed correctly and on time. Other matters arrive only by permission, which means the court chooses whether to grant review at all. Knowing which category your case falls into shapes every deadline and every document that follows.

Since the 2022 expansion, appeal of right covers most final judgments of the circuit courts. A criminal defendant convicted at trial can appeal by right. A party who loses a civil suit over money or property can appeal by right. Domestic relations rulings, including divorce, custody, spousal support, and child support, come up by right as well. Appeals from the Virginia Workers' Compensation Commission also reach the Court of Appeals by right. The common thread running through these categories is a final decision that ends the case in the court below.

Permission governs a narrower group of matters. Interlocutory orders, which resolve part of a case while the rest continues, generally cannot be appealed until the end, though statute lets a few come up early. Certain administrative appeals and specific procedural postures still require a petition. When permission is needed, the party files a petition for appeal that explains why the case merits review, and a judge or a panel decides whether the matter moves forward. A denial at that early stage ends the appeal before full briefing ever happens.

Criminal cases fill a large share of the Court of Appeals docket. A convicted defendant may challenge how the trial judge ruled on evidence, whether the proof was sufficient to convict, how the jury was instructed, or how the sentence was set. The court also hears appeals tied to probation and revocation. The Commonwealth's ability to appeal is far more limited than the defendant's, because a defendant acquitted at trial cannot be retried under double jeopardy principles. When the state does appeal, it usually challenges a pretrial ruling that guts its case, such as an order suppressing key evidence before trial.

Civil appeals span contract disputes, property fights, personal injury verdicts, and business litigation. Domestic relations work is a steady presence on the Court of Appeals docket, and it is often emotionally charged because it touches families and children. The court reviews equitable distribution of marital property, custody and visitation orders, and awards of support. These appeals frequently turn on whether the trial judge abused discretion rather than on a clean question of law, which changes how hard they are to win and how a lawyer should frame them.

Administrative appeals give the Court of Appeals a different kind of work. From the Workers' Compensation Commission, the court reviews awards and denials of benefits to injured workers. Under the Administrative Process Act, it can review certain decisions of state agencies. In these cases the court does not start fresh. It examines whether the agency followed the law and whether substantial evidence supported the findings, a posture that gives agency fact-finding real weight on review.

Some disputes do not belong on the Court of Appeals docket at all. A case still pending in circuit court is usually not ripe, because the court reviews final decisions rather than works in progress. Small matters decided in a general district court go to circuit court for a fresh trial instead of to the Court of Appeals. And certain categories, historically including capital cases and State Corporation Commission appeals, travel straight to the Supreme Court of Virginia. Reading the statute before you file saves a wasted fee and a quick dismissal.

Finality is the hinge for most of this. The clock to appeal starts when the circuit court enters a final order, and a notice aimed at a nonfinal ruling can be dismissed as premature. Litigants sometimes ask the trial court to reconsider first, and that motion can change the timing. The Court of Appeals watches these boundaries closely, because a court without jurisdiction has no power to decide, no matter how strong the underlying argument may be.

Across a typical term, the mix leans heavily on criminal and domestic relations cases, with workers' compensation and general civil appeals filling much of the remaining space. That balance reflects what Virginia's trial courts actually produce. A lawyer who practices regularly before the Court of Appeals learns the recurring issues in each category, because the same evidentiary and discretionary questions come back term after term. Familiarity with those patterns often matters more than raw eloquence.

The choice between the right track and the permission track affects strategy from day one. A defendant with an appeal of right knows the panel must take the case, so the work goes into sharpening the issues. A party facing the permission track must first convince the court that the question is worth its time, which is a different writing job. Counsel who confuse the two waste effort and sometimes miss a deadline that cannot be recovered. The statute, not instinct, tells you which track applies.

Knowing what this court can hear is half the battle. The other half is process. Deadlines, the record, the briefs, the panels, and the standard of review together decide whether a promising issue ever gets a fair hearing on the merits.

An appeal begins with a notice, not a brief. Under Rule 5A:6 of the Rules of the Supreme Court of Virginia, a party files a notice of appeal with the clerk of the trial court within 30 days after the final judgment. Miss that window and the Court of Appeals loses the power to hear the case, subject only to narrow exceptions. The notice itself is short. Its job is to tell the trial court, the opposing party, and the Court of Appeals that an appeal is on the way, so the machinery of transmitting the record can begin.

The record is the raw material of every appeal. It holds the pleadings, the exhibits, the trial court's orders, and the transcript of what was said in the courtroom. Under Rule 5A:8, the appellant must file the transcript, or an approved written statement of facts if no transcript exists, within a set period after the notice. A missing transcript can quietly sink an otherwise good appeal, because the Court of Appeals decides on what the record shows and nothing more. The court will not guess at testimony it cannot read.

What happened at trial controls what the Court of Appeals will consider later. Rule 5A:18 requires a party to state an objection clearly at the moment the ruling is made, so the trial judge has a fair chance to fix the problem then and there. An argument raised for the first time on appeal is usually treated as waived. This rule catches many litigants and even some lawyers off guard. The court will decline to reach an issue, however strong, if counsel stayed silent below, absent the narrow good cause or ends of justice exceptions the rule allows.

Briefs frame the fight on appeal. The opening brief must list assignments of error, which are precise statements of what the trial court got wrong. Under the Part Five A rules, each assignment ties to the place in the record where the issue was raised and ruled on. The appellee then answers, and the appellant may file a reply. The appellate bench reads all of this before argument, and a vague or sprawling brief hurts the party that files it. A sharp assignment of error, backed by clean record citations, hands the Court of Appeals a question it can actually decide.

Cases on the permission track run through a petition for appeal under Rule 5A:12. The petition argues why the issue deserves review. A judge of the judges, or a panel of judges, screens it. If the petition is granted, the case proceeds to full briefing much like an appeal of right. If it is refused, the matter usually ends at that point. This screening keeps weaker discretionary cases from consuming a full round of argument.

Three judges decide most appeals. The panel assigns each case to a panel drawn from its full bench, and the panel either hears oral argument or decides the case on the briefs alone. At argument, each side receives a fixed amount of time, and the judges break in with questions aimed at the weak spots. Oral argument rarely rescues a case the briefs have already lost, though it can tip a close one. After the panel confers, one judge writes the opinion for the court.

A single panel is not always the last word inside the court. A party who loses before a panel may ask the full This court to rehear the case en banc under the Part Five A rules. En banc review is saved for questions of unusual importance or for panel decisions that cannot be squared with each other. The larger court can reach a different result than the panel did. Only after that step does the losing side turn to the Supreme Court of Virginia.

How the court looks at an issue often decides the appeal before argument even opens. Pure questions of law get de novo review, which means the court owes no deference to the trial judge's legal conclusion and decides the point for itself. Findings of fact are much harder to overturn, because the court views the evidence in the light most favorable to the party who won below. Discretionary calls, such as evidentiary rulings and custody decisions, survive unless the trial judge abused that discretion. A lawyer who argues under the wrong standard fights uphill the whole way.

The remedies available are defined and finite. The appellate bench can affirm, which leaves the judgment untouched. It can reverse, wiping out the trial court's decision. It can remand, sending the case back for further proceedings under corrected instructions. It can modify a judgment in some situations. The one thing it will not do is retry the case. The court hears no new witnesses, weighs no credibility, and accepts no evidence that was never offered in the trial court.

Limits matter here as much as powers. The judges cannot substitute its own view of disputed facts for the jury's when some evidence supports the verdict. On a sufficiency challenge, the question is whether any rational fact-finder could have reached the same result. The appellate judges do not ask whether they personally would have voted that way. The court cannot look at documents outside the record, and it cannot grant relief on an issue that no one preserved. These boundaries keep the trial itself as the main event.

A litigant who respects these mechanics files on time, builds a full record, preserves each objection, and writes assignments of error the panel can actually rule on. Everything after that is argument. Get the procedure wrong and the best issue in Virginia law may never be decided on its merits.

A decision arrives as a written document, never a phone call. The Court of Appeals resolves most appeals through a panel of three judges, and that panel can rule by published opinion, unpublished opinion, or a short order. A published opinion binds later panels and every circuit and district court in Virginia until the full court or the Supreme Court of Virginia changes it. An unpublished opinion settles the case in front of the Court of Appeals but carries lighter weight, though the rules let lawyers cite it for whatever persuasive force it holds. Read the caption first. It tells you whether the judges affirmed, reversed, remanded, or ordered a new trial, and the reasoning that follows explains why.

Precedent controls how the next case comes out. Under Virginia's interpanel accord doctrine, one panel of the Court of Appeals cannot overrule a published decision of an earlier panel. Only the full court sitting en banc, or the Supreme Court of Virginia, can do that. So a published opinion you dislike is not merely persuasive against you, it is binding, and the way around it runs through rehearing or a higher court rather than a fresh panel. This is why the published and unpublished labels matter so much to a lawyer reading the result. A win in an unpublished order helps your client; a win in a published opinion helps every client with the same issue afterward.

Watch for a dissent or concurrence. When one judge on the Court of Appeals writes separately, that opinion has no binding force, yet it can flag the exact argument a higher court might find persuasive. A strong dissent sometimes becomes the roadmap for a petition to the Supreme Court of Virginia. It tells you which judge already agrees and why. Read it as a preview of the next round rather than a footnote.

If the panel rules against you, the first move is often a petition for rehearing. You ask the same three judges to reconsider, usually because they misread the record or missed a controlling authority. A separate route asks the entire This court to rehear the case en banc, where every active judge participates and a panel decision can be undone. The deadlines here are short and measured from the date of the decision, so calendar them the moment the opinion lands. A petition for rehearing is not a place to reargue everything. Pick the point where the panel went wrong and show it cleanly.

Winning en banc review is uncommon, and the standard is demanding. The full The court grants rehearing when a panel's holding conflicts with prior precedent or when the question carries weight beyond the single case. When the en banc court does sit, the earlier panel opinion is set aside on the issues taken up, and the larger group decides. Practitioners treat en banc practice as a distinct stage with its own briefing, not a second bite at the panel. The court expects focus, and scattered arguments rarely move it.

A remand sends the case back down, and its wording controls what happens next. The appellate bench may order a new trial or a narrow redo on a single issue while everything else stands. Read the mandate line by line, because a broad remand reopens more than a limited one. Trial courts follow the appellate instruction closely, and a party who tries to relitigate settled points on remand usually loses that fight.

The path from the judges to the Supreme Court of Virginia is narrow. For most cases you file a petition for appeal, and the higher court decides whether to take it. That review is discretionary, so a denial leaves the panel ruling in place as the final word. A limited set of matters carries an appeal of right onward, and Va. Code Ann. section 17.1-411 marks the categories. The 2021 reforms that gave Virginia an appeal of right into this court also reshaped what reaches the Supreme Court of Virginia, so confirm the current rule for your case type before assuming a second appeal is automatic. It usually is not.

Federal review is rarer still. The United States Supreme Court can review a final judgment from Virginia's highest court that turns on a question of federal law, under 28 U.S.C. section 1257, and only after you have exhausted the state process. A pure question of Virginia law, decided by the Court of Appeals and left alone by the Supreme Court of Virginia, generally ends in Richmond. To keep the federal door open, a litigant has to raise and preserve the federal issue in the trial court and again on appeal, the same discipline that governs every stage below. Miss that, and the federal claim is gone no matter how strong it reads.

Timing shapes strategy throughout. The mandate, the order that makes a decision effective, issues after the rehearing window closes, so a pending petition can pause enforcement while the appellate bench decides whether to revisit its ruling. Interest on money judgments keeps running during an appeal, and a party who lost below may need to post a bond to hold off collection. Talk with counsel about these mechanics before the opinion issues, not after. When you compare lawyers to handle a post-decision fight, this directory lists firms in an order set by plan tier, and that ordering is disclosed rather than hidden, so you can weigh a firm's placement against its actual appellate record in the judges.

Keep copies of everything the court sends. The opinion, any order on rehearing, and the mandate all carry dates that start or stop other clocks. If you plan to seek review in the Supreme Court of Virginia, the deadline runs from the panel decision, and a missed date ends the case as surely as a loss on the merits. Diary the dates the day each document arrives.

Section one placed the Court of Appeals between Virginia's trial courts and the Supreme Court of Virginia. That position shapes who you should hire. A lawyer who tried your case knows the facts cold, but the Court of Appeals cares about preserved error and the standard of review, always tied to the written record, and those are different muscles. Some trial lawyers handle their own appeals well. Others hand the file to appellate counsel and stay on as the guide to the record. Neither choice is wrong. The point is to match the lawyer to the work the Court of Appeals actually rewards.

Virginia keeps one bar for the whole state. Any attorney in good standing with the Virginia State Bar may appear before the Court of Appeals, and there is no separate appellate license to earn. A lawyer admitted elsewhere can still take part by moving for admission pro hac vice, with local counsel of record who answers to the Court of Appeals. When you interview a firm, confirm active Virginia standing first, then ask how often those lawyers actually file in this court. Membership and appellate practice are not the same thing.

Appellate skill shows up in specifics. Ask how many merits briefs the lawyer has filed in the court, how many oral arguments they have presented to its panels, and whether any of their cases produced a published opinion. Ask which assignments of error they would raise in your case and which they would drop, because a good appellate lawyer cuts weak issues rather than filing all of them. Ask how they handle the standard of review, since that single choice often decides the appeal. A lawyer who talks only about how unfair the trial was, without tying it to preserved error, has not thought like the appellate bench yet.

The daily work differs from a trial. There is no jury to persuade, no new evidence, no live testimony. The judges reads briefs and the record, then hears a focused argument where judges interrupt with questions. Writing carries the case. A brief that states the issue plainly, cites the record by page, and meets the Part Five A rules gives the judges a reason to rule your way. Sloppy citations and missed deadlines do the opposite, and the panel notices both.

Fee structures vary, and you should get the terms in writing. Some appellate lawyers charge by the hour, some quote a flat fee for the brief and argument, and a few blend the two. Separate costs from fees. Transcripts and printing are real expenses that land whether you win or lose, and the filing charge lands too. Ask for an estimate that splits this court stage from any later petition to the Supreme Court of Virginia, and ask what happens to the fee if the other side settles or the court rules without argument.

Ask about the scope in writing too. Does the fee cover a petition for rehearing if the panel rules against you, or does that count as new work? Will the same lawyer argue, or will a junior attorney handle the panel? Who drafts the brief and who reviews it? These answers tell you what you are buying. An engagement letter that spells out the court work, the rehearing option, and any appeal to the higher court keeps everyone honest when the pressure rises.

Before you sign anything, check the basics, and this directory is built to make that quick. Where a firm has earned verification, its checks are dated and editor-reviewed, and each appears with a name, a plain description, a status, and the date it was last confirmed. You can see whether a firm's Virginia bar standing was verified, whether its attorneys' admissions were confirmed, and when an editor last looked. A check reviewed last month tells you more than a marketing page that was never dated. Use those entries to narrow the field, then talk to the lawyers about your specific appeal in the appellate bench.

Look at more than the pitch. A firm's website tells you what it wants you to know; the verification entries tell you what an editor confirmed and when. If a status shows a check as pending or unconfirmed, that is information, not a red flag by itself, and you can ask the firm directly. Pair the dated checks in this directory with a direct question about recent filings, and you will know quickly whether the fit is real.

One good conversation reveals a lot. A lawyer who fits your appeal will explain the standard of review in plain words, name the two or three issues worth briefing, and tell you honestly whether the judges is likely to reverse. Reversal is never guaranteed, and a candid lawyer says so. Bring the trial court's order, the judgment date, and any notice of appeal already filed, since the deadline to reach the panel is measured in days, not months. If you have not filed yet, treat the calendar as the first order of business.

The placement described in section one is the frame for all of it. This court reviews what happened below; it does not start over. Your lawyer's job is to find the error the record supports, connect it to the governing standard, and present it so the judges can act. Hire for that, verify the credentials against dated checks, and settle the fee in writing. Then let the briefing carry the weight, because in front of the court the written argument decides most cases before anyone stands up to speak.