With the Nebraska state legislature voting to eliminate the state’s death penalty this May, there’s evidence that death penalty opponents are finding allies across the political spectrum in the move to eliminate the death penalty – even in traditionally conservative states, according to a Georgia State University expert on capital punishment.

Lauren Sudeall Lucas, assistant professor of law at Georgia State’s College of Law in Atlanta, said the reasons for the move to abolish the death penalty are wide-ranging, beyond the moral qualms surrounding its use.

“The debate in Nebraska is, I think, demonstrative of a larger phenomenon in criminal justice reform, in which conservatives – and libertarians in particular – concerned with big government and the spiraling costs of maintaining the U.S.’s vast criminal justice system, have become unexpected allies of progressives challenging oppressive criminal justice policies, including the death penalty,” Lucas explained.

Lucas, who teaches about constitutional law and capital punishment, worked as a staff attorney at the Southern Center for Human Rights, representing indigent clients facing the death penalty in Georgia and Alabama. She continues to serve on the center’s board of directors and is also on the Indigent Defense Committee of the State Bar of Georgia.

For a full biography, please visit http://law.gsu.edu/profile/lauren-sudeall-lucas/.