                                 CODE OF VIRGINIA

 ACTIONS TO EXTINGUISH CERTAIN CLAIMS (§ 45.2-401)

A. The owner or owners of land subject to a claim or right pursuant to &#xA7;
45.2-400 separately or jointly may bring an action requesting the extinguishment
of such claim or right. The person by whom such claim by such writing was
derived or reserved, or his successors in title, shall be made a defendant by
name so far as known or as defendants unknown if such successors in title are
unknown. The venue for such action shall be as specified in subdivision 3 of
&#xA7; 8.01-261.

B. The court shall allow a period of not less than six months from the time the
cause is docketed and set for hearing to elapse. During such time, the defendant
may explore and discover any commercial coal, mineral, ore, oil, or subsurface
substance.

C. In the absence of satisfactory evidence to the contrary, it shall be presumed
that no commercial coal, mineral, ore, oil, or subsurface substance exists in or
on the land, and the court shall enter an order declaring the claim or right to
be a cloud on the title and releasing the land therefrom and extinguishing such
claim or right. However, if the defendant or defendants prove that a commercial
coal, mineral, ore, oil, or subsurface substance exists in or on the land, the
court shall require such coal, mineral, ore, oil, or subsurface substance to be
charged with taxes according to law.

HISTORY: 1924, p. 720; 1930, p. 721; Michie Code 1942, § 6239a; 1944, p. 49;
Code 1950, § 55-155; 1977, c. 624; 2019, c. 712, § 45.1-161.311:11; 2021, Sp.
Sess. I, c. 387.