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Hermie Sadler and his legal team address the crowd in front of the Greensville County Courthouse following an October 2021 hearing. The two sides return to the courtroom Monday for the Sadler Bros. Oil lawsuit against the Commonwealth of Virginia’s ban on skill games.

 Mark Mathews/Independent-Messenger

On June 21, 2021, Emporia businessman Hermie Sadler and his legal team filed a lawsuit against then-Virginia Governor Ralph Northam, the Commonwealth of Virginia, the Virginia Attorney General’s Office, and Virginia Alcoholic Beverage Control Authority over a law, Senate Bill 971, that went into effect July 1, 2021, banning skill games.

The ban was in place for five months until Circuit Court Judge Louis Lerner decided to temporarily halt the commonwealth’s skill games ban on Dec. 6, 2021. The Virginia Supreme Court let the temporary injunction stand when it refused to take up the case in December of 2021 following an appeal from former Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring.

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