Elizabeth B. Lacy

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Elizabeth Bermingham Lacy (born 1945 in South Carolina) is a Virginia jurist and was the first woman named to the Virginia State Corporation Commission and subsequently was the first woman named to be a Justice of the Supreme Court of Virginia. Lacy is a graduate of St. Mary's College at Notre Dame and the University of Texas law school. Lacy practiced law in Texas before moving to Virginia.

Prior to her appointmet to the SCC by Governor Charles S. Robb, Lacy was the state Deputy Attorney General for Judicial Affairs, a division that prosecutes consumer protection violations, oversees the state's antitrust laws, state regulations and conflict of interest statutes. She was succeeded on the SCC by Del. Theodore V. Morrison Jr., a member of the General Assembly and a lawyer from Newport News, Virginia.

Lacy was appointed to the Supreme Court by Gov. Gerald L. Baliles on November 22, 1988. Her appointment was later confirmed by the General Assembly and she was subsequently elected to a seond 12-year term. Although by seniority she is the longest serving active member of the Supreme Court, Lacy has not served as Chief Justice of that Court to date. The Chief Justice was previously the senior active member of the Court, but a change in the law prior to the former Chief Justice Harry L. Carrico's retirement provided that in future the Chief Justice would be selected by an election of the Court members for a four-year term. Chief Justice Leroy Rountree Hassell, Sr., second in seniority to Justice Lacy, was elected Chief Justice under this new procedure and is presently serving his second term as Chief Justice.