Authority: Article VI, Section 1, Constitution of Virginia; Title 17.1, Chapter 5; § 19.2-163, Code of Virginia.

A. Out of the amounts for Pre-Trial, Trial and Appellate Processes shall be paid:

1. The annual salaries of Circuit Court judges, each at $138,028 from July 1, 2006, to November 24, 2006, $143,549 from November 25, 2006, to November 24, 2007, and $143,549 from November 25, 2007, to June 30, 2008. Such salaries shall represent the total compensation from all sources for Circuit Court judges.

2. Expenses necessarily incurred for the position of judge of the Circuit Court, including clerk hire not exceeding $1,500 a year for each judge.

3. The state's share of expenses incident to the prosecution of a petition for a writ of habeas corpus by an indigent petitioner, including payment of counsel fees as fixed by the Court; the expenses shall be paid upon receipt of an appropriate order from a Circuit Court.

B. The Chief Circuit Court Judge shall restrict the appointment of special justices to conduct involuntary mental commitment hearings to those unusual instances when no General District Court or Juvenile and Domestic Relations District Court Judge can be made available or when the volume of the hearings would require more than eight hours a week.

C. There is hereby reappropriated the unexpended balance remaining at the close of business on June 30, 2006, in the appropriation made in Item 32, Chapter 951, Acts of Assembly of 2005, in the item detail Other Court Costs and Allowances (Criminal Fund) and the balance remaining in this item detail on June 30, 2007.

D. The appropriation in this Item for Other Court Costs and Allowances shall be used to implement the provisions of § 8.01-384.1:1, Code of Virginia.

E.1. General fund appropriations for Other Court Costs and Allowances (Criminal Fund) total $88,715,432 the first year and $90,165,432 the second year in this item and Items 25, 31, 33, 34 and 35.  Included within this appropriation is $1,300,000 each year from the general fund, which is intended to enable the court to fully fund the existing statutory caps on compensation applicable to attorneys appointed by the court to defend criminal charges.

2. The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Virginia shall determine how the amounts appropriated to the Criminal Fund will be allocated, consistent with statutory provisions in the Code of Virginia.  It is the intent of the General Assembly that funds within these appropriations be used to fund fully the statutory caps on compensation applicable to attorneys appointed by the court to defend criminal charges.  Furthermore, it is the intent of the General Assembly that, should this appropriation not be sufficient to fund fully all of the statutory caps on compensation as established by § 19.2-163, Code of Virginia, that this appropriation shall be applied first to fully fund the statutory caps for the most serious noncapital felonies and then, should funds still remain in this appropriation, to the other statutory caps, in declining order of the severity of the charges to which each cap is applicable.