Dr Emma Milne’s research is interdisciplinary, focusing on criminal law and criminal justice responses to infant killing and foetal harm. The wider context of Emma’s work is social controls and regulations of all women, notably in relation to pregnancy, sex, and motherhood.
Mary Fraser is a modern social historian of the police. Her current work considers the extended role of the police, particularly in preventing civil unrest in the First World War. Her primary data sources are occupations journals. aims to produce research that informs policy and practice and advances our understanding of justice.
David Adlington-Rivers is currently researching hope in forensic settings as part of a PhD project.
Freedom is in the Mind is committed to exploring the potential of hope and transcendence for prisoners and ex-offenders through evidence-based academic research, providing positive psychological interventions to drive long term desistance from crime and life satisfaction.
Natalie Rutter’s current research work focuses on the stigmatisation of criminalised women, and the role of social media within this. General research interests and focus fall within the areas of desistance, gender, stigmatisation and probation delivery with a focus on narrative, visual and inclusion methodologies.
As an long standing academic in Policing Carol Cox provides advice and guidance on policy and current issues within the Criminal Justice arena.
Sarah Learmonth’s PhD research explores the effectiveness of bail use in rape cases from the perspective of adult female survivors and is an extension of her Masters study on bail use in rape cases.
The methodology includes primary interviews with women survivors and professionals in universities, police, social care, housing, barristers, solicitors and magistrates to explore what influence bail as protection discourse has on their affective evaluation of survivor allegations and claims to protection in the wider safeguarding framework. Survivors’ voices, indeed victims of any offence, have been consistently absent from any government consultations, policy, or legislation reform on bail, so it is in this context she argues the nexus of myth, discourse and affect serve ideological agendas with regard to the use of bail in rape cases, inhibiting knowledge construction in favour of preserving systemic authority.
A key focus of Layla Skinns’ research is police detention, in England and Wales, but also in other parts of the Anglophone world. In this setting, Layla examines police powers and their relationship with the law, police cultures and police discretion, and furthermore, how this impacts on equality and on state-citizen relations. She is also interested in how the public – particularly detainees – perceive the police, which links her research to police legitimacy and ‘good’ policing.
Over the last 15 years she has led research projects funded by the British Academy, the Howard League for Penal Reform and the Economic and Social Research Council. The most recent of these is the ‘good’ police custody study, which sought to ‘robustly’ examine what is meant by ‘good’ police custody and to instigate changes to police custody policies and practices in England and Wales.
Nicholas Hardwick’s research, teaching and practice builds and reflects on my previous roles leading organisations in the CJS. Nicholas’ particular interests are accountability in the criminal justice system, the administration and management of the prison system and the impact on and implications of digital technologies for justice.
Dr Annison’s interest centre on how political and policy making dynamics relate to penal change. Substantively, his areas of interest mainly include probation and parole.
A main focus of Katie Maras’ research is on autistic people’s experiences within the Criminal Justice System and the adaptations that can be made to accommodate their differences. Katie works with police and other legal professionals to provide evidence-based policy, guidance and training when working with autistic people, and she has particular expertise regarding police interviewing techniques. She is currently extending this work to courtroom questioning in a large ESRC-funded project running 2023-2026.
Exploring the root causes, manifestations and effects of shame as a driver of violence, including recently editing a book ‘Interdisciplinary Applications of Shame/Violence Theory: Breaking the Cycle’ (Palgrave Macmillan). Roman Gerodimos also designs and delivers shame-awareness workshops and works with diverse community groups – including museums, theatre ensembles, criminal justice stakeholders – to raise awareness of the role of shame across all levels from the individual to the social.
Ed Johnson is currently researching how the effective use of Pre-Charge Engagement could help reduce the backlog in the criminal courts and provide swifter resolutions for all involved in the criminal justice system,.
Danica Darley is a PhD student at the University of Sheffield, she also has personal experience of the criminal justice system having previously spent time in prison. Danica’s doctoral work examines the experiences of children in care with child criminal exploitation (CCE). The purpose of the research is for us to understand more from a young person’s perspective why some care-experienced young people can become criminally exploited. The project is co-produced with 3 young people who have experience of the care system and of child criminal exploitation.