Except as may otherwise be provided in §§ 16.1-266 through 16.1-268, whenever a person charged with a criminal offense the penalty for which may be confinement in the state correctional facility or jail, including charges for revocation of suspension of imposition or execution of sentence or probation, appears before any court without being represented by counsel, the court shall inform him of his right to counsel. The accused shall be allowed a reasonable opportunity to employ counsel or, if appropriate, the statement of indigence provided for in § 19.2-159 may be executed.
Va. Code Ann. § 19.2-157
Duty of court when accused appears without counsel
Applied in 4 court decisions — leading case Scott v. Illinois (1979)
Most recently applied in Manning v. Caldwell (August 2018)
Code 1950, §§ 19.1-241.1, 19.1-241.7; 1964, c. 657; 1966, c. 460; 1973, c. 316; 1975, c. 495; 1978, c. 362; 2021, Sp
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.