Virginia Dash Cams Must Sit Behind the Rear View Mirror

The base rule in subsection A of Va. Code 46.2-1054 makes it unlawful to drive with any object, other than a rear view mirror, a sun visor, or other vehicle equipment approved by the Superintendent of State Police, suspended from any part of the vehicle so as to substantially obstruct the driver's clear view of the highway through the windshield, the front side windows, or the rear window. It separately bars altering a passenger-carrying vehicle so as to obstruct the driver's view through the windshield. The word that does the work is substantially. Virginia does not draw a measured box on the glass the way some states do, so the question at the roadside and in court is whether the object materially blocks the view, not whether it touches the windshield at all.

Subsection C settles the dash camera question rather than leaving it to that judgment call. Added by 2023, c. 235, it states that nothing in the section shall be construed to prohibit the suspension and use of any dashboard camera and any accompanying wires or attachments, on two conditions. First, the suspension and use must not be otherwise prohibited by Title 49 of the Code of Federal Regulations, the federal motor carrier rules, which matters for commercial drivers. Second, the camera, its wires and its attachments must be wholly or mostly concealed behind the rear view mirror without any additional obstruction to the driver's view. That is a placement rule with teeth: the cable run counts, not just the camera body. Tucking the lead up into the headliner and down the A pillar is what the statute contemplates. A cable taped in a loop across the middle of the windshield is an additional obstruction even if the camera itself hides behind the mirror.

The safety inspection treats interior windshield devices more generously than the statute does, and the two are worth reading together. A note under 19VAC30-70-210 B 5 tells inspectors that a vehicle up to 10,000 pounds GVWR presented with a navigational device, a video event recording device, or a crash avoidance camera mounted on the interior of the windshield shall be issued an approval sticker, if no other violations are detected, when the entire device sits outside the area swept by the windshield wipers or in any location above the AS-1 line. So a camera high on the glass above the AS-1 line, or off to one side outside the wiper sweep, passes the annual inspection, while subsection C is what keeps an officer from writing a summons at the roadside. The same regulation places toll transponders at the inside center of the windshield at the roof line just above the rear view mirror, or immediately to the right of the mirror at the roof line if space does not allow, which is a useful marker of what Virginia considers the acceptable zone.

Subsection A also carries three express exceptions that show how narrowly the general prohibition is drawn: an obstructed rear window is fine if the vehicle has a mirror on each side showing at least 200 feet of highway to the rear, safety devices may be installed on the windshields of vehicles owned by private waste haulers or local governments and used to transport solid waste, and bicycle racks may be installed on the front of a bus operated by a city, county, transit authority, or transit or transportation district. The alteration clause does not apply to lawful immobilization of a vehicle under Va. Code 46.2-1216 or 46.2-1231, which is what permits a wheel boot with a windshield notice.

Recording is a separate question from mounting, and Virginia answers it favorably for dash cam owners. Va. Code 19.2-62 makes intentional interception of a wire, electronic or oral communication a Class 6 felony, but subdivision B 2 provides it is not a criminal offense where the person intercepting is a party to the communication or one of the parties has given prior consent. Virginia is therefore a one-party consent jurisdiction, so a driver may record audio of conversations in his own car in which he takes part. A camera left running to capture a conversation among passengers the driver is not part of, without anyone's consent, does not fall within that exception.

A violation of Va. 2-1054 is a traffic infraction under Va. 2-113, with a fine capped at the Class 4 misdemeanor maximum of $250 fixed by Va. 2-11. The practical enforcement picture changed with the 2020 special session, which added subsection B: no law-enforcement officer may stop a motor vehicle for a violation of this section, and no evidence discovered or obtained as the result of such a stop is admissible in any trial, hearing or other proceeding, including evidence obtained with the operator's consent.

That is why an air freshener, a parking placard or a badly placed dash cam can no longer be the reason a Virginia driver is pulled over, and why anything an officer finds after making such a stop is suppressed. A summons can still be written after a lawful stop for another reason. At inspection time the consequence is different: a device that fails the glazing rules in 19VAC30-70-210 earns a rejection sticker rather than a ticket, and Va. 2-1158 makes that sticker valid for 15 calendar days, during which the operator cannot be charged with the equipment violation while the problem is corrected.

Commercial drivers face the additional federal layer that subsection C preserves, since a mounting permitted by Virginia law is still unlawful if Title 49 of the Code of Federal Regulations prohibits it.