If any person maliciously, or with intent to defraud an insurance company or other person, set fire to or burn or destroy by any explosive device or substance, or cause to be burned, or destroyed by any explosive device or substance, or aid, counsel, or procure the burning or destroying by any explosive device or substance, of any personal property, standing grain or other crop, he shall, if the thing burnt or destroyed be of the value of $1,000 or more, be guilty of a Class 4 felony; and if the thing burnt or destroyed be of less value, he shall be guilty of a Class 1 misdemeanor.
Va. Code Ann. § 18.2-81
Burning or destroying personal property, standing grain, etc
Applied in 4 court decisions — leading case United States v. Furlow (2019)
Most recently applied in United States v. Furlow (June 2019)
Code 1950, §§ 18.1-79, 18.1-85; 1960, c. 358; 1972, c. 53; 1975, cc. 14, 15; 1981, c. 197; 2018, cc. 764, 765; 2020, cc. 89, 401.
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.