The sale of any property levied on under a fieri facias or distress warrant shall be suspended at the instance of any claimant thereof who will deliver to the officer a suspending bond, with good security, in a penalty equal to double the value thereof, payable to such officer, with condition to pay to all persons who may be injured by suspending the sale thereof, until the claim thereto is adjudicated or otherwise adjusted, such damage as they may sustain by such suspension. If the property claimed to be liable by virtue of such process is in the possession of any of the parties against whom such process was issued, but is claimed by any other person, or is claimed to belong to any other person, the officer having such process in his hands to be executed shall, whether an indemnifying bond has been given or not, after notice to the claimant, or his agent, proceed to execute the same notwithstanding such claim, unless the claimant of such property or someone for him shall give the suspending bond aforesaid, and shall within thirty days after such bond is given proceed to have the title to such property settled in accordance with the provisions of this chapter. And in case such claimant or someone for him fails to give a suspending bond, or having given such bond fails to have such proceedings instituted to settle the title thereto, the claimant shall be barred from asserting such claim to the property and the sale of the property shall proceed. For the purpose of this section, a person making a claim of ownership of property on behalf of another shall be deemed to be the latter's agent, and the notice required by this section may be verbal or in writing. Upon any such indemnifying or suspending bond as is mentioned in this section or § 8.01-369 an action may be prosecuted in the name of the officer for the benefit of the claimant, creditor, purchaser, or other person injured, and such damages recovered in such action as a jury may assess. The action may be prosecuted and a writ of fieri facias had in the name of such officer when he is dead in like manner as if he were alive.

Code 1950, § 8-232; 1977, c. 617.