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Covering your face is illegal

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Sir Edward:
At the convention I'm attending this weekend, it came up that it's illegal in Virginia to wear masks/helmets in public. Not only is it illegal, but it's a felony. A Class-6 Felony specifically, which is harsher than the class-1 misdemeanor you'd get for impersonating a cop, were you to do that.

This came up since apparently this weekend, a cop gave a warning to the "Umbrella Corporation" costumed folks here, and the Mandalorian Mercenaries said they've been hassled by cops as well.

Googling a little, I found this thread mentioning it, and they highlight some of the exceptions under the law, which include safety equipment (as part of a profession), and holiday costumes (which means Halloween of course), or a masquerade ball, which you can see here:

http://www.fairfaxunderground.com/forum/read/2/34357/34444.html

Here's the relevant part of the Virginia code:

http://law.justia.com/codes/virginia/2006/toc1802000/18.2-422.html

This is important to know, since we have helmets. If we do events off of renfaire grounds, this becomes an issue. And if you find a cop who's having a bad day, he may try to stick it to you.

I'm assuming other states may have similar provisions, so it may be worth looking into if you are active elsewhere.

Leganoth:
All i have to say is: thats stupid as hell.

Sir Brian:
Well it is certainly something we needed to know. I am fairly confident however in our case there would be a less likely chance of us be rousted by the police since if we're outside the area of a fairground or event we typically wouldn't be wearing our helms. I am honestly I would rather not wear it than wear it, and I only wear it as often as I do at faire because of the photo ops requests or my arm gets sore from carrying it.  :-\

SirNathanQ:
I'm contec\nt to kick around in my coif most of the time myself. I'll need to look up WVs laws on that. We might be pretty lax. After all, I can legally wear a sharp sword anywhere except the courthouse and schools in my hometown.

(I looked this up for Holloween.)

Sir Wolf:
haahah

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