Welcome to our annual CJC PhD Conference!

"Between Challenge and Innovation: Critical Provocations in Criminal Justice" | Friday 9th May 9:30- 16:00

10- 11:20 Panel 1: Frontline Justice, (Crim)Migration and Asylum

Anneliese Hall: “Healthcare professionals and street level bureaucracy: immigration healthcare in England and Wales”

The purpose of this PhD is to focus on the emotional and moral dilemmas faced by healthcare professionals when caring for undocumented immigrants within England and Wales, amid restrictive policies designed to limit immigrant access to public services. The focus will be on healthcare professionals in their capacity as street-level bureaucrats. The project will seek to understand moral dilemmas faced and how discretionary power is used by bringing together several elements of discussion: borders, immigration, street-level bureaucrats and healthcare. Through researching these elements in conjunction, the research seeks to understand the first-hand experiences of healthcare professionals as it pertains to their interactions with immigrants. There is a vast body of literature on the work of street-level bureaucrats, and on immigrant access to healthcare respectively. As such, this research will combine the topics whilst drawing on broader frames such as concepts of healthcare deservingness and medical humanitarianism. In terms of the methodology of this project, a qualitative interview study will be been designed, in which healthcare professionals within a range of settings will be interviewed. These settings are hospitals, clinics, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and immigration removal centres.

Bio: I am a 1st year PhD student within Warwick law school. My research focuses on healthcare workers in their capacity as street level bureaucrats as they deliver healthcare to undocumented immigrants.

Ewart Hodge: “Adjusting Claims of Power/Knowledge: A Post-Intentional Phenomenology of Loss Adjusters and Insurance Claims Fraud”

Insurance companies investigate spurious and dishonest claims on a daily basis. Large and more complex property claims are contracted out to loss adjusters who act on behalf of their insurer clients, validating claims, and potentially uncovering fraud. Despite the ubiquitous contracting of loss adjusters within the UK, there is a significant lack of research focussing on their role—notably how handling (potentially) fraudulent claims impacts loss adjusters’ subjectivities. Utilising a Foucauldian power/knowledge analysis and post-intentional phenomenological methodology, this research employed anecdotal writing and unstructured interviews to investigate the lived experiences of loss adjusters whose primary role is handling property insurance claims. This presentation shares findings from doctoral research that loss adjusters transform themselves in relation to others—constructing their subjectivity—via knowledge productions within power relations and practices. This research pierces the hermetic nature of the insurance industry, providing the first in-depth study of the often-hidden work of loss adjusters, visibilising their subjectivities and improving our understanding of how counter-fraud strategies affect the lived experiences of frontline claims staff.

Bio: Ewart Hodge is a sixth-year professional doctorate candidate in Criminology and Criminal Justice at Keele University, and a Major & Complex Loss Adjuster Manager at Crawford & Company.

Bel Rawson: “Colonial Vicissitudes and Crime: Asylum Systems in Australia and Britain”

Mechanisms of criminalisation and exclusion of asylum seekers are increasingly strengthened by Western states. This often begins by manufacturing a 'crisis' that ostensibly necessitates the rushing through of new laws that criminalise asylum seekers, while simultaneously curbing humanitarian and human rights protections. Using Australia and Britain as examples, I contextualise their policy and law-making trajectories on asylum by what I refer as a 'symbiotic' and 'parasitic' relationship between the two countries that began with colonialism in 1788. While Britain has had very different historical, social, and cultural trajectories than Australia given their respective roles as coloniser and colony, we are now seeing the colonial relationship reaffirmed through policy convergence, and a return to colonial tools of oppression such as overcriminalisation. Through hailing Australia's cruelty towards asylum seekers as a 'success story', Britain feeds into a delusion it created through its colonisation and which it seeks to sustain through close imitation. That is, that imperialistic systems and ideologies that reinforce racialised hierarchies of vulnerability and human worth are preferable. This paper offers an explanatory critique of the ways in which laws that criminalise asylum seekers in Australia and Britain perpetuate colonial control and maintain the systematic oppression of the racialised 'Other'. In doing so, this paper suggests that asylum systems have undergone significant changes influenced by colonial relationships and that contemporary asylum laws cannot be understood without examining their colonial origins and continuing postcolonial influences.

Bio: Bel is a PhD Candidate at Warwick Law School (on the Vulnerable State project) and a qualified lawyer. Her PhD project involves researching the colonial legacies that underpin contemporary asylum law, and the emotional dimensions of working in UK Asylum and Immigration Tribunals.

Celestine A.-M. Robert: “The role of civil societies in the access to care for protection seeking women who were or are victim of sexual violence and sexual exploitation in France”

Recent years have seen emerged research projects emphasising the prevalence of sexual violence and sexual exploitation (SVE) among populations of women asylum seekers, and refugees (ASR) in France. In a 2023 study, 26.6% of asylum seeking (AS) women in Southern France, have reported having experience sexual assault and 4.8% being raped in the year preceding their study - more than 18 times the percentage of the general population (0.26%). And, despite these proportions, only one out of ten asylum seeking women contacted care or police services after having been victimised. Several reasons (i.e., different cultural conceptions of violence, fear of reprisals, etc.) were exposed to prevent women from seeking support. Through interviews and a qualitative network analysis, the present study will explore how civil societies (grassroot ones and internationally recognised ones) may support asylum seeking women but also refugee women's path to care. This will enable an in-depth comparison between the services available to AS women and refugee women, as well as between services offered by non-grassroot organisations, grassroot organisations, and grassroot organisations focusing on supporting ASR women.

Bio: After having been introduced to the traumatology of victims of sexual violence and to border criminologies, and after my volunteering experience with exiled populations, I have decided to apply for a PhD exploring the available care for protection seeking women. As of May 2025, I am in the process of re-defining my methodology while working on my first chapter. 

Chair: Paola Zichi

Coffee Break (11:20- 11:40)

11:40- 13:00 Panel 2: Experiences of Crime, Criminalisation and Punishment

Jenny Dalzell: "After murder and manslaughter: what are some of the impacts on friends and family in the wake of tragedy?"

Family and friends of homicide victims often have extended contact with the criminal justice system and may experience grief and coping in different ways from others. Bereavement through homicide is cited as having detrimental and continually adverse effects across various facets of life, including as emotional, financial, physical, social, and spiritual. Although there is a recognition that family and friends are 'victims' or 'survivors' themselves, it is unclear what this group require or want from the criminal justice system and whether the system can meet those needs. This paper presents early findings from my PhD research which focuses on understanding the lived experience of people bereaved through homicide. The session will discuss key emerging themes relating to the criminal justice experience, including how contact with can add 'another layer to grief', the impact of early interactions with police, problems in court, and how sentencing is not straight forward or final. The session will also outline the proposed research methods (narrative interviews, participant observation and autoethnography) and discuss how participants will be accessed through a UK charity called 'Support After Murder & Manslaughter', of which the researcher is a member and volunteer.

Bio: My name is Jenny and I am a first year PGR based in the sociology department. My research is exploring the lived experience of family and friends who are bereaved by homicide, I'm particularly interested in how the criminal justice system and its processes and personnel impact and grief.

Ritu Nousheen: "Shadow Incarceration: Women's Experiences of Pretrial Detention in Bangladesh"

Punishment, although a growing object of study, has largely been confined within Eurocentric, androcentric and nation-state boundaries. Most of the classic theories of punishment have turned a blind eye to the role of colonialism and gender in shaping penal practice, especially in Global South countries. This creates questions as to how does our understanding of punishment change when we consider its gendered dimensions? What are some overlooked aspects underlying the canonical assumptions in sociology of punishment ordained by our 'founding fathers'? What novel insights can we develop in the study of punishment when we shift our routine masculinist and Eurocentric gaze towards the margins? Against such context, my research problematises the institution of pretrial detention in Bangladesh though the experiences of women detainees. This empirical research is situated in context of British colonial preventive detention practices in the Indian subcontinent to understand the colonial roots, its sustained and ruptured 'continuities' in penal institutions, discourses and practices in contemporary Bangladesh. Using a feminist and decolonial approach, I intend to conduct a prison ethnography on women detainees in Kashimpur Female Central Jail in Gazipur which is the only dedicated women-only prison in Bangladesh. I will explore how women experience pretrial detention and exercise agency within these punitive spaces. Primarily based on literature review, the findings will contribute to conceptualising pretrial detention as a form of punishment, potentially challenging our understanding and logic of punishment. Additionally, women's exercise of agency within these spaces can nuance our understanding of gendered punishment and punitive governance.

Bio: Nousheen Sharmila Ritu is a first year PhD student in the Faculty of Law at University of Warwick. Her research focuses on pretrial detention in Bangladesh to critique issues of state punishment especially in Global South countries.

Feiyu Li: "Parenthood and Offending Trajectories: A Longitudinal Cross-Cohort Analysis in the UK"

Crime remains a critical concern in the UK, however, research on crime patterns often lacks detailed exploration of how parenthood influences offending and desistance, especially in understanding gender differences and the specific influence of fatherhood. Evidence also suggests that ineffective family dynamics and relationships with legal authorities significantly shape crime rates and adherence to the law, yet these factors have not been sufficiently investigated. This study will utilise the data from four longitudinal cohort studies conducted by UCL. Through multinomial regression analysis, the research will identify the potential influence of family and legal socialization—such as family size, attitudes toward the law or police, and other related factors—on the correlation between parenthood and offending patterns within each of cohort. Additionally, the research enhances insights of fatherhood, which is often under-explored in gendered studies of crime journeys. Lastly, the research will examine whether these influences differ across cohorts and to identify the underlying reasons for such differences. The study aims to enrich the existing literature and open avenues for further critical reflections on the intersections of life events, socialisation, and offending trajectories. Meanwhile, to inform better policy implication and to provide future research directions in this area.

Bio: Krystal Li is a first-year PhD student in Women and Gender Studies. Her research aims to examine the relationship between parenthood and offending trajectories, drawing on longitudinal data in the UK.

Faye Claridge: "Incarcerated and invisible? Visual Arts' Potential for Criminological Research"

I propose to present my emerging research into UK prisoner anonymity and the layered impacts of the practice of removing names from visual artwork in exhibitions by incarcerated people. Within the limited field of arts in incarceration scholarship, visual art is particularly under researched, despite having great potential for countering social invisibility. With a presentation rich in images, I will explore if the intrinsically visual qualities of visual art render the field peculiarly appropriate for exploring the practice of social exclusion in punishment and its individual and societal impacts. My presentation will examine features of hand-made artworks containing discernible human traces and discuss the ideological potential of these to assert individuality, counter to the dehumanising project of punishment. This will be balanced with consideration of victim impact and the ways in which victims also experience anonymity, stereotyping and dehumanisation within the tactics of political crime-presentation. The audience role will also be considered, as engaging with visual art is an act much-contemplated by philosophers and often described in degrees of cooperation, bridging distance between artwork and viewer. In the context of prison, this collaborative act offers distinct possibilities for sporadic cohesion in a system built on social inequality and separation. This will present the backdrop for my research, which will develop into a fuller examination of the ways in which the potentials outlined are impacted by exhibitor anonymity. I am a first year part-time PhD candidate and a practicing artist.

Bio: I am an artist and AHRC Midlands4Cities researcher examining the impacts of anonymity imposed on prisoners sharing artworks publicly. I am in my first year at the University of Warwick, researching part-time whilst delivering socially engaged art projects, including a sculpture for the National Trust co-designed at HMP Hewell and an international touring exhibition of art and poetry made in prisons.

Chair: Amanda Wilson

Lunch (13:00- 14:00)

14:00- 15:15 Panel 3: Technology, AI, and Justice

Barbara Goncalves Branco: "Algorithmic realist perspectives of predictive technologies deployed in criminal justice settings"

The increasing use of predictive technologies in criminal justice is predominantly grounded on evidence-based discourses aimed at decreasing subjectivity in human decision-making. This approach implies that predictive technologies are inherently objective – a questionable assumption that I analyze through 'algorithmic realism' lenses, i.e. a framework inspired by legal realism, but applied to algorithmic interventions. The paper starts situating the reader within 'algorithmic realism', acknowledging that algorithmic interventions require contextualization, porousness and political reflexiveness. Subsequently, the paper explains the functioning of predictive technologies, before engaging conceptual tools borrowed from Sociology of Quantification to exemplify how subjectivity is inherent to these technologies. The first concept is commensuration: a process of simplification of the social world that eliminates discretion and absorbs uncertainty. The second notion is measures' reactivity – meaning that measures serve not only as calculation, but also as elements that shape reality, directing attention to certain issues, persuading audiences and establishing new categories for understanding the world. In conclusion, this paper asserts the need for further assessment of prevailing criminal justice discourses, since quantification of the social is a process requiring human input and decision-making. It is worth noting that measurement allows the neoliberal logic of competitiveness to spread throughout social domains and activities, making it an essential mechanism of governance that creates differentiations and consolidates inequalities. As such, uncritically incorporating the measurement logic to criminal justice settings (where social disparities already abound) through the deployment of predictive technologies could have the effect of disguising inequality as objectivity and rationality.

Bio: Barbara is a 1st year PhD student at the University of Warwick, where she is studying the phenomenon of predictive criminal justice. Her research focuses on actuarial technologies used to ‘predict’ specific outcomes, such as recidivism.

Carlo Piparo: “In Bello of the AI. Uses and limits through the lenses of fundamental rights”

In this work, we will analyze the concept of legal personhood, trying to answer the following question: "Can we ascribe to Artificial Intelligence criminal law legal personhood?". Artificial Intelligence represents the most dynamic and evolving area of technological advancement, promising to reshape industries, economies, and social structures. But it is also a source of radical novelty in conceptualizing AI's capabilities, legal status, and the impact it could have on society. The debates on AI are carried on around the lines of "strong" or complex AI versus "weak" or soft AI, which is pressing into service more fundamental questions about the ontology of machine intelligence and agency. While weak AI systems, such as Siri or Alexa, are designed to perform specific, predefined tasks, they lack the autonomous learning, reasoning, and adaptability that characterize strong AI, which aspires to emulate human cognitive functions. This distinction between hard and soft AI provides a foundation for addressing whether AI can genuinely be considered intelligent or whether it merely replicates the appearance of intelligence through computational processes. Thus, this work will be divided into 4 sections: first, will be analyzed the concept of AI in the context of the digital revolution; second, will be analyzed the relationship between AI and criminal law; third, will be analyzed the concept of legal personhood, especially in the field of criminal law; last, we will be answer the question: "Can we ascribe to Artificial Intelligence criminal law legal personhood?", motivating the output.

Bio: Police commissioner, already lawyer, already data scientist. PhD fellow in AI and criminal law at University of Udine and University of Seville. Visiting reaearcher at CEU, Comenius University of Bratislava, University of Buenos Aires, and University of Elche.

James White: ‘Can you complete this sentence for__?’

In criminal (and sometimes civil) law there is a deep-seated resistance to probablistic evidence. This is often explored by tweaking time-honoured ‘paradoxes’ eg rodeo: 10,000 attend a rodeo, 100 tickets are sold; the probability is 99% any spectator has no ticket so is a trespasser, thief or fraudster. What is wrong with conviction on that basis? Surely that is beyond the threshold of reasonable doubt!

Sometimes, the objection is expressed in the term ‘sensitivity’, ie the belief is not sensitive to evidence that disproves it. Another example, lottery: you have one lottery ticket, 46 million are sold. That is enough (echoing the jury direction) ‘so that you are sure’ you have not won. But as a belief this is not sensitive to whether or not you have won –its basis would not change even had you ‘bagged the bonus ball’.

The prime objection, number one, is that no amount of probability is enough to ‘make it so’. Probability is addressed to what is likely and the criminal process to what is so.

Yet, as we grow accustomed to AI, Apple’s servers predict my next word and with Microsoft’s will reply to messages. It’s never quite right, but sometimes -I confess- I accept it as close enough.

I do not let it write my narrative, only respond. But if probability is enough and actuality not all that, one novel suggestion is, in crime, might AI perhaps develop to serve our sentences for us?

Bio: I am a PhD student in Warwick Law School, researching the role truth plays in the courtroom and how moral truth of human interaction is supplanted by ‘legal truth’. I am interested in issues of proof and fallibility, epistemology and ontological truth.