Virginia Democrats Move To Soften Robbery Laws

Virginia Democrats are once again tinkering with criminal law, this time under the soothing language of “conforming,” but the substance of HB 244 tells a far more troubling story.

Introduced earlier this month by Democratic delegate Vivian Watts and now sitting in the House Courts of Justice Committee, HB 244 purports to update statutory references to robbery so they align with the tiered robbery system enacted in 2021. But buried inside the bureaucratic phrasing is a sweeping reworking of how robbery is treated across sentencing, parole, and early release laws — changes that consistently tilt in one direction: lighter consequences for criminals.

The bill narrows the definition of “acts of violence” to include only the two highest degrees of robbery, excluding the lower degrees from that category. It alters how robbery offenses are scored under sentencing guidelines, potentially reducing recommended prison time. It also expands eligibility for enhanced earned sentence credits and conditional release — including retroactive application — for offenders convicted of the lesser degrees of robbery, even allowing early release for those deemed terminally ill.

Perhaps most striking, HB 244 weakens Virginia’s three-strikes law. Under the bill, mandatory life sentences would apply only to the two highest degrees of robbery, and parole eligibility could be restored if even one of the three qualifying convictions involved a lower-degree robbery. In plain English, repeat offenders once locked away for life could now see a path back onto the streets.

Supporters frame the bill as a technical fix that preserves robbery as a predicate offense and keeps higher-degree robberies classified as violent crimes. But critics see a familiar pattern: leftist criminal justice reform that sounds compassionate on paper and proves disastrous in reality.

That concern is not hypothetical. As reported by The Daily Caller in July 2025, nearly half of inmates released early under Virginia’s Democrat-backed Enhanced Earned Sentence Credits program were arrested again within a year. Republican Attorney General Jason Miyares blasted the law, urging legislators to “fix” a system that prioritizes offender leniency over public safety.

At a press conference, victims’ families delivered a grim rebuke to reform activists. Angela Tyler-Tann, whose son was murdered by an offender released early despite a lengthy criminal record, put it plainly: “People’s lives are not video games that can be paused or restarted. My son’s death is final.”

HB 244 has not yet reached the House floor, but it fits squarely into a pattern Virginia voters are increasingly questioning — reforms that gamble with public safety and ask ordinary citizens to bear the cost when the experiment fails.