The writ of prohibition shall lie as a matter of right in all cases of usurpation and abuse of power, when the inferior court has not jurisdiction of the subject matter in controversy, or, having such jurisdiction, exceeds its legitimate powers.
W. Va. Code § 53-1-1
When writ of prohibition lies as matter of right
Applied in 70 court decisions — leading case 196 W. Va. 251 - State Ex Rel. Amy M. v. Kaufman (1996)
Most recently applied in State of WV Ex Rel Eric W. Lewis v. The Honorable Kurt W. Hall and David Godwin (March 2019)
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: West Virginia Legislature. Reproduced from public-domain West Virginia statutes; confirm against the official source for the current text. Not legal advice.