Virginia Supreme Court considers whether the vulnerable-adult statute covers temporary intoxication

The Virginia Supreme Court heard argument over whether the phrase “other causes” in the Commonwealth’s vulnerable‑adult law should be read broadly to include very temporary incapacitation, or narrowly to reach only longer‑standing disabilities.

Appellant’s counsel Ivan Farenbach told the court the case is a “pure and clean statutory construction” question and argued the statute’s ordinary language and listed examples ("mental illness, physical illness, intellectual or developmental disability") indicate limitations that do not ordinarily describe intoxication. “You don’t say he’s intoxicated, he’s got some limitations,” Farenbach said, urging the court to avoid a reading that would make those enumerated terms surplusage.

The Commonwealth’s counsel, Victoria Johnson, urged the court to affirm the court of appeals, saying the victim here “lacked the understanding or capacity to make, communicate, or carry out reasonable decisions” and therefore met the statute’s impairment thresholds. Johnson argued the statute’s impairment language—"the extent the adult lacks sufficient understanding or capacity"—provides the limiting principle, not the root cause or the temporariness of the condition. She stressed the factual severity, saying the victim suffered a near‑fatal overdose, was “visibly blue,” and had to be given naloxone twice in the field and a subsequent naloxone drip.

Justices pressed both sides with hypotheticals. One Justice asked whether chronic alcoholism that produced a persistent condition would meet the statute while a single occasion of being drugged at a bar would not; another asked whether someone who involuntarily is drugged is in the same vulnerable state as a long‑term addict. Counsel for the appellant acknowledged that chronic, diagnosable conditions could qualify, but said the present case involved an acute, temporary state that should not automatically be equated with the long‑term impairments the statute contemplates. Counsel for the Commonwealth replied that the statute’s focus is the extent of the impairment—whether the adult cannot safeguard person or property—not the cause or its permanence.

The court and counsel also discussed whether a defendant’s conduct (for example, preventing bystanders from rendering aid or discouraging a 911 call) can make the defendant a “responsible person” under the statute; Johnson said the defendant’s conduct in discouraging aid was central to the trial court’s finding that he put himself in that role.

The arguments highlighted the competing textual and practical concerns: a broad reading could expand exposure to vulnerable‑adult prosecutions for many crimes involving impaired victims, while a narrow reading could exclude victims who are temporarily incapacitated but in need of protection. No decision was issued from the bench; the court recessed and will reconvene at 9:00 a.m. the next day to continue in‑camera argument.