Virginia has long had laws allowing courts to keep people convicted of animal cruelty from owning animals. But there has been a more practical problem: How is someone else supposed to know?

A shelter deciding whether to approve an adoption, a rescue placing an animal with a foster family, or even a private citizen considering rehoming a pet may have had no simple way to determine whether the person standing in front of them had previously been convicted of a serious animal-cruelty offense.

Chesapeake is trying to close that gap.

On Aug. 11, the Chesapeake City Council voted unanimously, 8-0, to implement an animal-cruelty registry. The first of its kind in Hampton Roads. The public database will identify people convicted of certain felony offenses involving animals and will be accessible through the city’s Animal Services website. The Chesapeake Police Department is expected to maintain the registry using conviction records from across Virginia. The registry is significant, but understanding what it does requires understanding something it does not do.

The registry does not itself create a prohibition on animal ownership.

Those restrictions already exist elsewhere in Virginia law.

Under Virginia Code § 3.2-6570, a court may prohibit a person convicted of felony animal cruelty from possessing or owning companion or equine animals for life. Someone convicted of a misdemeanor violation may similarly be prohibited from owning or possessing those animals for up to five years. Violating such a court-imposed restriction is itself a Class 1 misdemeanor, and animals kept in violation of the order can be seized and forfeited. Someone prohibited from animal ownership following a felony conviction may petition the court for restoration of those rights after five years.

Chesapeake’s registry serves a different purpose. It makes certain conviction information visible.

From Richmond to Chesapeake

The authority for Chesapeake’s registry can be traced to Virginia’s 2024 General Assembly session. Senate Bill 93, sponsored by Sen. William Stanley Jr., and its identical House counterpart, House Bill 62, authorized Virginia localities to create computerized animal-cruelty registries. The legislation was enacted in 2024 and became Virginia Code § 3.2-6573.1.

The law allows, but does not require, cities and counties to establish their own registries. Under the statute, a local registry can include people convicted of felony violations involving animal cruelty, animal fighting, maiming, killing or poisoning an animal, or killing or injuring a police animal.

The database may contain an offender’s name and address at the time of conviction, the offense involved, and the date and place of conviction. Virginia law specifically allows that information to be made publicly accessible through the website of either the locality or its police department. The state left implementation to individual local governments, including the cost.

That means Virginia did not establish one comprehensive statewide public database. Instead, lawmakers gave localities the ability to build their own. Henrico County was among those that moved first. Henrico now maintains a public registry under the same Virginia statute. Its database identifies individuals convicted of qualifying felony offenses, including their names, dates of birth, offenses and conviction dates. Henrico says one purpose of its registry is to make conviction information available so that affected individuals are not able to purchase animals after their convictions.

Chesapeake is now bringing that model to Hampton Roads.

The Chesapeake Push

The city’s registry did not begin with this week’s vote. Chesapeake City Council records show that on Dec. 9, 2025, Councilwoman Amanda Newins directed city staff to move forward with implementing an animal-cruelty registry. Mayor Rick West asked Newins to modify the request and instead have staff bring Council a proposed policy and recommendations for consideration. Newins agreed. Eight months later, the proposal returned for approval.

Newins, an attorney and former Chesapeake prosecutor who also fosters and volunteers for local animal shelters, has characterized the registry as a tool for shelters, rescues and fosters to determine whether a prospective animal owner has previously been convicted of a felony involving animal cruelty. Following Council’s unanimous approval, Chesapeake becomes the first Hampton Roads locality reported to have implemented such a registry.

What the Registry Can and Cannot Tell You

There is an important limitation. Virginia’s registry statute applies to specified felony convictions. It does not create a database of everyone who has ever been accused of mistreating an animal. Arrests and pending charges are not convictions, and Chesapeake’s registry will not include misdemeanor animal-cruelty offenses under its current framework. That creates an unusual divide in Virginia law.

A judge can impose an animal-ownership restriction following certain misdemeanor animal-cruelty convictions for as long as five years. Yet the state’s registry statute authorizes local databases based on specified felony convictions. In other words, absence from the registry should not automatically be interpreted to mean that a person has no animal-cruelty history or that no court restriction applies to them. The database is a tool; not a complete record of every animal-related case or restriction in Virginia.

Newins has already said she would like to see the system eventually expand beyond felonies to include misdemeanor animal-cruelty convictions. Chesapeake Humane Society Executive Director Debbie Hughes has similarly expressed interest in broader access to such information. The distinction could become one of the most consequential questions surrounding the registry as it begins operating.

Fifteen Years on the List

Virginia law also provides a path for removal. A person may request removal from a local animal-cruelty registry no earlier than 15 years after the violation that resulted in inclusion, provided that the individual has no additional qualifying felony convictions. Localities can also create procedures for removing records when a person has died, received a pardon, or had a conviction reversed. That 15-year period is separate from an individual’s court-ordered prohibition on animal ownership. Again, the two systems serve different functions.

One concerns what a court has ordered a particular person to do, or not do. The other concerns whether specified conviction information is publicly visible.

Turning a Law Into Something Usable

Laws against animal cruelty are only one part of protecting animals from repeat abuse.

Convictions can punish someone after an offense occurs. Courts can restrict future animal ownership. But those mechanisms leave another question for the shelter employee, rescue volunteer or ordinary person deciding where an animal goes next: How would they know? That is where Chesapeake’s registry may prove most consequential.

Hughes told WTKR that her organization has discussed checking animal-cruelty histories in the past, but lacked a reliable resource for doing so. She said the Chesapeake Humane Society is now considering whether the new registry could become part of its screening process for adopters, fosters and volunteers. Whether other organizations adopt similar practices remains to be seen. So does the question of whether neighboring Hampton Roads cities will follow Chesapeake’s example. Virginia’s General Assembly created the legal framework in 2024. Henrico demonstrated one way that framework could be implemented. Chesapeake has now brought the concept to Hampton Roads.

The next question is whether a collection of local registries will eventually become something larger; or whether access to animal-cruelty histories will depend on which side of a city or county line someone happens to live.

For now, Chesapeake has taken an existing power in Virginia law and added something that was much harder to come by before: a way for the public to see it.

Stay tuned. As of now The Undivided Truth plans to continue reporting on the implementation of Chesapeake’s animal-cruelty registry, including how local shelters and rescues plan to use it, how records will be collected and maintained, and whether officials believe the system should ultimately be expanded.