VENUE Act

The VENUE Act changes where federal criminal cases are filed for offenses committed on federal property within the National Capital Region (NCR), which includes Washington, D.C., parts of Maryland and Virginia. It allows charges to be filed in the defendant's last legal residence district (or Washington, D.C.) instead of the location of the crime, and permits defendants to request a transfer to their home district court. However, defendants not domiciled in the U.S. cannot request this transfer, and the first defendant to file such a motion gets priority if multiple defendants do so. This applies to all pending cases not yet scheduled for trial where the crime occurred on federal property in the NCR.