Terms Used In Virginia Code > Title 6.2 > Subtitle III > Chapter 21 - Check Cashers

• Adoption: means the transfer of ownership of a dog or a cat, or any other companion animal, from a releasing agency to an individual. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• Animal: means any nonhuman vertebrate species except fish. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• Animal control officer: means a person appointed as an animal control officer or deputy animal control officer as provided in § 3. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• Beneficiary: A person who is entitled to receive the benefits or proceeds of a will, trust, insurance policy, retirement plan, annuity, or other contract. ^{Source: OCC}
• Boarding establishment: means a place or establishment other than a public or private animal shelter where companion animals not owned by the proprietor are sheltered, fed, and watered in exchange for a fee. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• care: means the responsible practice of good animal husbandry, handling, production, management, confinement, feeding, watering, protection, shelter, transportation, treatment, and, when necessary, euthanasia, appropriate for the age, species, condition, size and type of the animal and the provision of veterinary care when needed to prevent suffering or impairment of health. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• Check casher: means a person engaged in the business of cashing checks, drafts, or money orders for compensation. See Virginia Code 6.2-2100
• Chief: means the Chief of the Division of Mines of the Department of Energy. See Virginia Code 45.2-100
• Commission: means the State Corporation Commission. See Virginia Code 6.2-100
• Commissioner: means the Commissioner of Financial Institutions. See Virginia Code 6.2-100
• Companion animal: means any domestic or feral dog, domestic or feral cat, nonhuman primate, guinea pig, hamster, rabbit not raised for human food or fiber, exotic or native animal, reptile, exotic or native bird, or any feral animal or any animal under the care, custody, or ownership of a person or any animal that is bought, sold, traded, or bartered by any person. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• Complaint: A written statement by the plaintiff stating the wrongs allegedly committed by the defendant.
• Consumer: means any natural person purchasing an animal from a dealer or pet shop or hiring the services of a boarding establishment. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• Conviction: A judgement of guilt against a criminal defendant.
• Corporation: means a private or public corporation, association, or trust issuing a security. See Virginia Code 13.1-434
• Dealer: means any person who in the regular course of business for compensation or profit buys, sells, transfers, exchanges, or barters companion animals. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• Decedent: A deceased person.
• Eligible employee stock ownership plan: means an employee stock ownership plan as such term is defined in § 4975(e)(7) of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended, sponsored by a professional corporation and with respect to which:

  1. See Virginia Code 13.1-543

• Emergency veterinary treatment: means veterinary treatment to stabilize a life-threatening condition, alleviate suffering, prevent further disease transmission, or prevent further disease progression. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• Enclosure: means a structure used to house or restrict animals from running at large. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• Euthanasia: means the humane destruction of an animal accomplished by a method that involves instantaneous unconsciousness and immediate death or by a method that involves anesthesia, produced by an agent that causes painless loss of consciousness, and death during such loss of consciousness. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• exercise: means the opportunity for the animal to move sufficiently to maintain normal muscle tone and mass for the age, species, size, and condition of the animal. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• Facility: means a building or portion thereof as designated by the State Veterinarian, other than a private residential dwelling and its surrounding grounds, that is used to contain a primary enclosure or enclosures in which animals are housed or kept. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• Fraud: Intentional deception resulting in injury to another.
• Groomer: means any person who, for a fee, cleans, trims, brushes, makes neat, manicures, or treats for external parasites any animal. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• Humane: means any action taken in consideration of and with the intent to provide for the animal's health and well-being. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• Humane investigator: means a person who has been appointed by a circuit court as a humane investigator as provided in § 3. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• Includes: means includes, but not limited to. See Virginia Code 1-218
• Item: means a check, draft, or money order. See Virginia Code 6.2-2100
• Kennel: means any establishment in which five or more canines, felines, or hybrids of either are kept for the purpose of breeding, hunting, training, renting, buying, boarding, selling, or showing. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• Law-enforcement officer: means any person who is a full-time or part-time employee of a police department or sheriff's office that is part of or administered by the Commonwealth or any political subdivision thereof and who is responsible for the prevention and detection of crime and the enforcement of the penal, traffic or highway laws of the Commonwealth. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• Livestock: includes all domestic or domesticated: bovine animals; equine animals; ovine animals; porcine animals; cervidae animals; capradae animals; animals of the genus Lama or Vicugna; ratites; fish or shellfish in aquaculture facilities, as defined in § 3. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• Ordinance: means any law, rule, regulation, or ordinance adopted by the governing body of any locality. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• Owner: means any person who: (i) has a right of property in an animal; (ii) keeps or harbors an animal; (iii) has an animal in his care; or (iv) acts as a custodian of an animal. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• Partnership: A voluntary contract between two or more persons to pool some or all of their assets into a business, with the agreement that there will be a proportional sharing of profits and losses.
• Person: means any individual, corporation, partnership, association, cooperative, limited liability company, trust, joint venture, government, political subdivision, or other legal or commercial entity. See Virginia Code 6.2-100
• Personal representative: includes the executor of a will or the administrator of the estate of a decedent, the administrator of such estate with the will annexed, the administrator of such estate unadministered by a former representative, whether there is a will or not, any person who is under the order of a circuit court to take into his possession the estate of a decedent for administration, and every other curator of a decedent's estate, for or against whom suits may be brought for causes of action that accrued to or against the decedent. See Virginia Code 1-234
• Precedent: A court decision in an earlier case with facts and law similar to a dispute currently before a court. Precedent will ordinarily govern the decision of a later similar case, unless a party can show that it was wrongly decided or that it differed in some significant way.
• Professional corporation: means a corporation whose articles of incorporation set forth a sole and specific purpose permitted by this chapter and that is either (i) organized under this chapter for the sole and specific purpose of rendering professional service other than that of architects, professional engineers, land surveyors, or landscape architects, or using a title other than that of certified interior designers and, except as expressly otherwise permitted by this chapter, that has as its shareholders or members only individuals or professional business entities that are duly licensed or otherwise legally authorized to render the same professional service as the corporation, including the trustees of an eligible employee stock ownership plan or (ii) organized under this chapter for the sole and specific purpose of rendering the professional services of architects, professional engineers, land surveyors, or landscape architects, or using the title of certified interior designers, or any combination thereof, and at least two-thirds of whose shares are held by persons duly licensed within the Commonwealth to perform the services of an architect, professional engineer, land surveyor, or landscape architect, including the trustees of an eligible employee stock ownership plan, or by persons legally authorized within the Commonwealth to use the title of certified interior designer; or (iii) organized under this chapter or under Chapter 10 of Title 54. See Virginia Code 13.1-543
• Professional service: means any type of personal service to the public that requires as a condition precedent to the rendering of such service or use of such title the obtaining of a license, certification, or other legal authorization and shall be limited to the personal services rendered by pharmacists, optometrists, physical therapists and physical therapist assistants, practitioners of the healing arts, advanced practice registered nurses, practitioners of the behavioral science professions, veterinarians, surgeons, dentists, architects, professional engineers, land surveyors, landscape architects, certified interior designers, public accountants, certified public accountants, attorneys-at-law, insurance consultants, and audiologists or speech pathologists. See Virginia Code 13.1-543
• Public animal shelter: means a facility operated by the Commonwealth, or any locality, for the purpose of impounding or sheltering seized, stray, homeless, abandoned, unwanted, or surrendered animals or a facility operated for the same purpose under a contract with any locality. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• Registrant: means a person registered under this chapter. See Virginia Code 6.2-2100
• Registration: means a registration filed under this chapter. See Virginia Code 6.2-2100
• Releasing agency: means (i) a public animal shelter or (ii) a private animal shelter, humane society, animal welfare organization, society for the prevention of cruelty to animals, or other similar entity or home-based rescue that releases companion animals for adoption. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• Right of survivorship: The ownership rights that result in the acquisition of title to property by reason of having survived other co-owners.
• Security: includes any share of stock, bond, debenture, note or other security issued by a corporation and registered as to ownership on the books of the corporation. See Virginia Code 13.1-434
• state agency: means the same as that term is defined in § 2. See Virginia Code 1-206
• State Veterinarian: means the veterinarian employed by the Commissioner as provided in § 3. See Virginia Code 3.2-5900
• Summons: Another word for subpoena used by the criminal justice system.
• Transfer agent: includes any person employed or authorized to transfer securities issued by a corporation, including a registrar. See Virginia Code 13.1-434
• Treasurer: includes the treasurer and his assistants of each county or city or other officer designated by law to collect taxes in such county or city. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500
• Trustee: A person or institution holding and administering property in trust.
• Veterinary treatment: means treatment by or on the order of a duly licensed veterinarian. See Virginia Code 3.2-6500