Possibly, but it depends entirely on how your case is resolved, and this is where many students make a costly mistake. Virginia expungement law under Va. Code § 19.2-392.2 generally allows expungement only when a charge was dismissed, nolle prossed, or resulted in an acquittal. If you plead guilty, or if the court makes a finding that the evidence was sufficient for guilt, that charge will stay on your record.
Here is the trap. Virginia offers a first offender option for underage possession cases that ends in a dismissal. That sounds great, but if the dismissal comes after a finding that the evidence was sufficient to convict, Virginia courts have held that the charge does not qualify for expungement. Two students can walk out of the same courtroom with dismissed charges, and only one of them will ever be able to clear the arrest from public view.
This is exactly why the way your lawyer handles the case matters so much. Joel works to resolve Minor in Possession charges in a manner that keeps his clients eligible for expungement whenever possible. When the case qualifies, the expungement itself is a separate civil filing that normally takes about six months from petition to sealed record, so it pays to start early rather than waiting until a job or graduate school application is on the line.
If you have already resolved a charge and want to know whether it qualifies, or you have a new charge and want to protect your options, call Joel at 540-961-5297. You can also read more about expungement in Virginia and about defending Minor in Possession charges in Blacksburg.