The word "obscene" where it appears in this article shall mean that which, considered as a whole, has as its dominant theme or purpose an appeal to the prurient interest in sex, that is, a shameful or morbid interest in nudity, sexual conduct, sexual excitement, excretory functions or products thereof or sadomasochistic abuse, and which goes substantially beyond customary limits of candor in description or representation of such matters and which, taken as a whole, does not have serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value.
Va. Code Ann. § 18.2-372
"Obscene" defined
Applied in 7 court decisions — leading case New York v. Ferber (1982)
Most recently applied in 29 I. & N. Dec. 110 - MAYORGA IPINA (June 2025)
Code 1950, § 18.1-227; 1960, c. 233; 1975, cc. 14, 15.
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.