A. Except as provided in subsection B, if any person knowing of the commission of an offense takes any money or reward, or an engagement therefor, upon an agreement or understanding, expressed or implied, to compound or conceal such offense, or not to prosecute therefor, or not to give evidence thereof, he shall, if such offense is a felony, be guilty of a Class 2 misdemeanor; and if such offense is not a felony, unless it is punishable merely by forfeiture to him, he shall be guilty of a Class 4 misdemeanor.
B. Any person, other than the victim of the crime or the husband, wife, parent, grandparent, child, grandchild, brother, or sister, by consanguinity or affinity of the offender, who with actual knowledge of the commission by another of any felony offense under Chapter 4 (§ 18.2-30 et seq.) of this title, willfully conceals, alters, dismembers, or destroys any item of physical evidence with the intent to delay, impede, obstruct, prevent, or hinder the investigation, apprehension, prosecution, conviction, or punishment of any person regarding such offense is guilty of a Class 6 felony.
Code 1950, § 18.1-303; 1960, c. 358; 1975, cc. 14, 15; 2005, c. 408.
Notes of Decisions
Lamberto Maldonado v. Commonwealth of Virginia, 829 S.E.2d 570 (Va. Ct. App. 2019).
“For example, Code § 18.2-462 makes it a criminal offense to “delay, impede, obstruct, prevent, or hinder the investigation, apprehension, prosecution, conviction or punishment of any person.”
Stumpf v. Commonwealth, 379 S.E.2d 480 (Va. Ct. App. 1989).
· cites it 2× “She played an active role in the concealment of the crime by agreement with her husband and received money from the robbery in violation of Code § 18.2-462. Moreover, a conspiracy is not terminated by commission of the crime until the spoils are divided and the co-conspirators…”
Franklin Jerome Coleman, Jr. v. Commonwealth of Virginia, No. 0584232 (Va. Ct. App. Aug. 20, 2024).
· cites it 2× “The sentencing order, however, lists a conviction for the substantive offense of altering or destroying evidence of a felony and references only Code § 18.2-462, a Class 6 felony, as the offense of conviction.”
Meredith v. Meredith, 39 Va. Cir. 590 (Virginia Beach Cir. Ct. 1994).
· cites it 2× “Therefore, based on Virginia Code § 18.2-462 and Ellis v. Peoples Nat’l Bank of Manassas, 166 Va.”
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