                                 CODE OF VIRGINIA

INDEMNIFYING BOND TO OFFICER (§ 8.01-367)

A. If any officer levies or is required to levy a fieri facias, an attachment,
or a warrant of distress on property, and the officer doubts whether such
property is liable to such levy, he may give the plaintiff, his agent or
attorney-at-law, notice that an indemnifying bond is required in the case; bond
may thereupon be given by any person, with good security, payable to the officer
in a penalty equal to the value of the property in the case of a fieri facias or
a warrant of distress on property and equal to double the value of the property
in case of an attachment, with condition to indemnify him against all damage
which he may sustain in consequence of the seizure or sale of such property and
to pay to any claimant of such property all damage which he may sustain in
consequence of such seizure or sale, and also to warrant and defend to any
purchaser of the property such estate or interest therein as is sold. If the
officer has performed more than one levy for a single plaintiff, the officer may
permit the plaintiff to give a single indemnifying bond for such levies,
provided that any such bond shall be in a penalty amount not less than the
aggregate sum of the penalty amounts of the bonds required had the levies been
bonded individually.
			Provided, however, that when the property claimed to be liable by virtue of
the process aforesaid is in the possession of any of the parties against whom
such process was issued but is claimed by any other person or is claimed to
belong to any other person, the officer having such process in his hands to be
executed shall proceed to execute the same notwithstanding such claim unless the
claimant of the property or someone for him shall give a suspending bond as
provided by &#xA7; 8.01-370 and shall within 30 days after such bond is given
proceed to have the title to the property settled in accordance with the
provisions of this chapter. And in case such claimant or someone for him fails
to give such suspending bond, or having given such bond fails to have such
proceedings instituted to settle the title thereto, the claimant shall be barred
from asserting such claim to the property and the officer shall proceed to
execute the process, and the officer who executes such process shall not be
liable to any such claimant for any damages resulting from the proper execution
of such process as is required by this section. If an indemnifying bond is not
given within a reasonable time after such notice, the officer may refuse to levy
on such property, or may restore it to the person from whose possession it was
taken. If such bond is given, the officer shall proceed to levy (i) if he has
not already done so, or (ii) if necessary to restore a levy previously released.

B. The Commonwealth shall not be required to give an indemnifying bond under the
provisions of this section.

HISTORY: Code 1950, § 8-229; 1968, c. 490; 1972, c. 327; 1977, c. 617; 2005, c.
690; 2012, c. 206.