A Virginia judge is set to hear competing motions on Wednesday after Gun Owners of America and the Virginia Citizens Defense League asked the Lynchburg Circuit Court to hold the superintendent of the Virginia State Police in contempt for resuming private-sale background checks while a permanent injunction against those checks remained in force. Bearing Arms reported on June 2 that the hearing before Judge F. Patrick Yeatts could determine the enforcement posture of Virginia's contested background check requirement for months to come.

The case, Wilson et al. v. Colonel Matthew D. Hanley, originated as a challenge to Virginia's universal background check law for private firearms transfers — the requirement that anyone selling a gun privately must run the buyer through the state's background check system, the same process required of licensed dealers. In October 2025, Judge Yeatts entered a permanent injunction, finding that the law discriminated against adults between 18 and 20 years old on equal protection grounds and prohibiting its enforcement anywhere in the state.

The dispute sharpened this spring when Governor Abigail Spanberger signed HB 1525 into law in April 2026. The bill directed the Virginia State Police to resume enforcing the background check requirement and carried an emergency clause intended to put it into immediate effect — bypassing the standard delayed implementation window. On May 29, state police notified firearms dealers across the state that private-sale background checks would resume, despite Judge Yeatts's injunction still being formally in place.

GOA and VCDL responded by filing a contempt motion asking the court to hold Virginia State Police Col. Matthew D. Hanley personally liable for the agency's decision to defy the standing order. On the other side, Attorney General Jay Jones filed a competing motion arguing the injunction should be dissolved in light of HB 1525 and asserting the order had been rendered moot by the new legislation.

A separate legal question shadows both motions: whether HB 1525's emergency clause was constitutionally enacted in the first place. Under Article IV, Section 13 of the Virginia Constitution, an emergency provision requires a four-fifths vote in each chamber. The bill cleared the Senate on a 21-18 vote and the House on a 63-36 vote — both well short of four-fifths — raising the possibility that the emergency designation itself was invalid, meaning the standard delayed effective date should have applied regardless of the injunction.

The hearing carries implications beyond Virginia. GOA and VCDL have argued that a state cannot use legislation and an emergency proclamation to unilaterally override a court order, a principle that, if affirmed, would constrain how other governors attempt to work around pre-enforcement injunctions on gun laws. Courthouse News Service noted the case frames a direct separation-of-powers question before the Lynchburg bench.

Judge Yeatts is expected to rule on both the contempt motion and the motion to dissolve before the hearing closes. If he holds the state police chief in contempt, the agency would face sanctions while any appeal is pending; if he grants the motion to dissolve, the background check requirement would resume without legal obstacle unless the plaintiffs seek an emergency stay from a higher court.