Virginia Code 17.1-403: Rules of practice, procedure, and internal processes; promulgation by Supreme Court; amendments; summary disposition of appeals
The Supreme Court shall prescribe and publish the initial rules governing practice, procedure, and internal processes for the Court of Appeals designed to achieve the just, speedy, and inexpensive disposition of all litigation in that court consistent with the ends of justice and to maintain uniformity in the law of the Commonwealth. Before amending the rules thereafter, the Supreme Court shall receive and consider recommendations from the Court of Appeals. The rules shall prescribe procedures (i) authorizing the Court of Appeals to prescribe truncated record or appendix preparation and (ii) permitting the Court of Appeals to dispense with oral argument if the parties agree that oral argument is not necessary or if the panel has examined the briefs and record and unanimously agrees that oral argument is unnecessary because (a) the appeal is wholly without merit or (b) the dispositive issue or issues have been authoritatively decided, and the appellant has not argued that the case law should be overturned, extended, modified, or reversed.
Terms Used In Virginia Code 17.1-403
- Appeal: A request made after a trial, asking another court (usually the court of appeals) to decide whether the trial was conducted properly. To make such a request is "to appeal" or "to take an appeal." One who appeals is called the appellant.
- Case law: The law as laid down in cases that have been decided in the decisions of the courts.
- Litigation: A case, controversy, or lawsuit. Participants (plaintiffs and defendants) in lawsuits are called litigants.
- Oral argument: An opportunity for lawyers to summarize their position before the court and also to answer the judges' questions.
- Supreme Court: means the Supreme Court of Virginia. See Virginia Code 1-249
1983, c. 413, § 17-116.03; 1984, cc. 632, 701; 1998, c. 872; 2021, Sp. Sess. I, c. 489; 2022, c. 714.