Virginia SB 1776: Divorce; grounds of cruelty, abuse, desertion, or abandonment, waiting period.

Bill Text

Bill Tracking - 2019 session > Legislation 

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2019 SESSION

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19104459D

SENATE BILL NO. 1776 

Offered January 18, 2019 

A BILL to amend and reenact � 20-91 of the Code of Virginia, 
 relating to grounds for divorce; cruelty, abuse, desertion, or abandonment; 
 waiting period. 
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Patron-- Saslaw 

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Referred to Committee for Courts of Justice 

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Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Virginia:

1. That � 20-91 of the Code of Virginia is amended and 
 reenacted as follows:

� 20-91. Grounds for divorce from bond of matrimony; contents 
 of decree.

A. A divorce from the bond of matrimony may be decreed:

(1) For adultery; or for sodomy or buggery committed outside 
 the marriage;

(2) [Repealed.]

(3) Where either of the parties subsequent to the marriage has 
 been convicted of a felony, sentenced to confinement for more than one year and 
 confined for such felony subsequent to such conviction, and cohabitation has 
 not been resumed after knowledge of such confinement (in which case no pardon 
 granted to the party so sentenced shall restore such party to his or her 
 conjugal rights);

(4), (5) [Repealed.]

(6) Where either party has been guilty of cruelty, caused 
 reasonable apprehension of bodily hurt, or willfully deserted or abandoned the 
 other, such divorce may be decreed to the innocent party 
 after a period of one year from the date of such act; or

(7), (8) [Repealed.]

(9) (a) On the application of either party if and when the 
 husband and wife have lived separate and apart without any cohabitation and 
 without interruption for one year. In any case where the parties have entered 
 into a separation agreement and there are no minor children either born of the 
 parties, born of either party and adopted by the other or adopted by both 
 parties, a divorce may be decreed on application if and when the husband and 
 wife have lived separately and apart without cohabitation and without 
 interruption for six months. A plea of res adjudicata or of recrimination with 
 respect to any other provision of this section shall not be a bar to either 
 party obtaining a divorce on this ground; nor shall it be a bar that either 
 party has been adjudged insane, either before or after such separation has 
 commenced, but at the expiration of one year or six months, whichever is 
 applicable, from the commencement of such separation, the grounds for divorce 
 shall be deemed to be complete, and the committee of the insane defendant, if 
 there be one, shall be made a party to the cause, or if there be no committee, 
 then the court shall appoint a guardian ad litem to represent the insane 
 defendant.

(b) This subdivision (9) shall apply whether the separation 
 commenced prior to its enactment or shall commence thereafter. Where