“I think it makes a lot of sense,” Herring said in an interview. “If someone is able to get to the phone and report that they need help they shouldn’t have to be thinking, ‘Will I get in trouble?’ “

The proposal would not apply in instances where a search warrant was being issued or protect an overdose victim from prosecution for crimes unrelated to an overdose.

Herring said he knew of occasions in which people had faced drug-related charges after an overdose in the city of Richmond, which has seen opioid-related fatalities triple between 2010 and 2015.

“I have heard and been involved in conversations with lawyers here who say the current statute is broken and needs to be fixed,” Herring said.

The number of people in Richmond who survived overdosing on heroin alone has increased nearly 300 percent in the past three years — from 88 in 2014 to 343 during the entirety of 2016, according to police.

The city is not alone. Virginia’s public health commissioner declared a state of emergency in November over the ballooning opioid crisis.