CHAPTER 332

AN ACT to provide for the admissibility in evidence of certain
photostatic or photographic reproductions, and the effect
thereof.

[S 117]
Approved April 5, 1950

Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Virginia:

§ 1. Use of photographic copies of business and public records
in evidence.—If any business, institution, member of a profession or
calling, or any department or agency of government, in the regular
course of business or activity has kept or recorded any memoran-
dum, writing, entry, print, representation or combination thereof
of any act, transaction, occurrence or event, and in the regular
course of business has caused any or all of the same to be recorded,
copied or reproduced by any photographic, photostatic, microfilm,
microcard, miniature photographic, or other process which accu-
rately reproduces or forms a durable medium for so reproducing
the original, the original may be destroyed in the regular course
of business unless held in a custodial or fiduciary capacity or unless
its preservation is required by law, or its validity has been ques-
tioned. Such reproduction, if substantially the same size as the
original, when satisfactorily identified, is as admissible in evidence
as the original itself in any judicial or administrative proceeding
whether the original is in existence or not and an enlargement or
facsimile of such reproduction is likewise admissible in evidence
if the original reproduction is in existence and available for inspec-
tion under direction of court. The introduction of a reproduced
record, enlargement or facsimile, does not preclude admission of
the original.

§ 2. Reproduction in the regular course of business shall be
construed to include reproduction at a later time, if done in good
faith and without intent to defraud.