A civil action in a general district court may be brought by warrant directed to the sheriff or to any other person authorized to serve process in such county or city, requiring the person against whom the claim is asserted to appear before the court on a certain day, not exceeding 90 days from the date of service thereof, to answer the complaint of the plaintiff set out in the warrant. After the warrant has been issued and delivered for service it shall not be altered, nor any blank filled, except by order of the court.
Va. Code Ann. § 16.1-79
Actions brought on warrant
Applied in 4 court decisions — leading case Elyazidi v. Suntrust Bank (2015)
Most recently applied in Samayoa-Bolanos v. Williams (August 2015)
1956, c. 555; 1991, c. 26; 2025, c. 349.
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
Official source: Virginia Law Portal (LIS). Reproduced from public-domain Virginia statutes; confirm against the official source for the current text. Not legal advice.