2025 SESSION

SENATE SUBSTITUTE

25108321D

SENATE BILL NO. 881

AMENDMENT IN THE NATURE OF A SUBSTITUTE

(Proposed by the Governor

on March 24, 2025)

(Patron Prior to Substitute—Senator Ebbin)

A BILL to amend and reenact §§ 18.2-53.1 and 18.2-308.5 of the Code of Virginia, relating to plastic firearms; use, manufacture, sale, transfer, etc., prohibited; penalties.

Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Virginia:

1. That §§ 18.2-53.1 and 18.2-308.5 of the Code of Virginia are amended and reenacted as follows:

§ 18.2-53.1. Use or display of firearm in committing felony.

It shall be is unlawful for any person to use or attempt to use any pistol, shotgun, rifle, or other firearm, including a plastic firearm as defined in § 18.2-308.5, or display such weapon in a threatening manner while committing or attempting to commit murder, rape, forcible sodomy, inanimate or animate object sexual penetration as defined in § 18.2-67.2, robbery, carjacking, burglary, malicious wounding as defined in § 18.2-51, malicious bodily injury to a law-enforcement officer as defined in § 18.2-51.1, aggravated malicious wounding as defined in § 18.2-51.2, malicious wounding by mob as defined in § 18.2-41 or abduction. Violation of this section shall constitute constitutes a separate and distinct felony and any person found guilty thereof shall be sentenced to a mandatory minimum term of imprisonment of three years for a first conviction, and to a mandatory minimum term of five 10 years for a second or subsequent conviction under the provisions of this section. Such punishment shall be separate and apart from, and shall be made to run consecutively with, any punishment received for the commission of the primary felony.

§ 18.2-308.5. Manufacture, import, sale, transfer, or possession of plastic firearm prohibited; penalty.

It shall be is unlawful for any person to knowingly manufacture, import, sell, transfer, or possess any plastic firearm. As used in this section, "plastic firearm" means any firearm, including machine guns and sawed-off shotguns as defined in this chapter, containing less than 3.7 ounces of electromagnetically detectable metal in the barrel, slide, cylinder, frame or receiver of which, when subjected to inspection by X-ray machines commonly used at airports, does not generate an image that accurately depicts its shape. A violation of this section shall be is punishable as a Class 5 felony.

2. That the provisions of this act may result in a net increase in periods of imprisonment or commitment. Pursuant to § 30-19.1:4 of the Code of Virginia, the estimated amount of the necessary appropriation cannot be determined for periods of imprisonment in state adult correctional facilities; therefore, Chapter 2 of the Acts of Assembly of 2024, Special Session I, requires the Virginia Criminal Sentencing Commission to assign a minimum fiscal impact of $50,000. Pursuant to § 30-19.1:4 of the Code of Virginia, the estimated amount of the necessary appropriation cannot be determined for periods of commitment to the custody of the Department of Juvenile Justice.