Research Area Spotlight: Criminal Justice

Dr. Frank Edwards studies fatal police violence and how the politics of Black exploitation and Native elimination jointly structure the operation of U.S. social policy systems.  received his Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of Washington in 2017 and joined the Rutgers-Newark School of Criminal Justice in 2018.

Dr. Edwards is a sociologist broadly interested in social control, the welfare state, race, and applied statistics. His work explores the causes and consequences of the social distribution of state violence through two projects.

The first draws attention to child protection systems as key sites of family disruption. This work shows that American child protection systems are tightly intertwined with carceral and welfare policy systems, and that race and colonization play a central role in explaining the spatial and social distribution of family separation.

The second provides detailed analyses of the prevalence of police-involved killings in the US. This project uses novel data and Bayesian methods to provide estimates of mortality risk by race, sex, and place. It also evaluates how institutions and politics affect the prevalence of police violence.

His research has been published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, American Sociological Review, American Journal of Public Health, and other outlets. His research has been covered in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, The PBS News Hour, and other outlets.

Publications:

• Edwards, Frank R., Sarah Roberts, Mical Raz, Kathleen Kenny, Matty Lichtenstein, and Mishka Terplan. 2023. “Medical professional reports and child welfare system infant investigations: an analysis of National Child Abuse and Neglect Data System (NCANDS) data”. Health Equity. 

• Edwards, Frank R., Kelley Fong, Victoria Copeland, Mical Raz, and Alan Dettlaff. 2023. “Administrative Burdens in Child Welfare”. The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of The Social Sciences. 

• Edwards, Frank R., Theresa Rocha Beardall, and Hannah Curtis. 2023. “American Indian and Alaska Native overexposure to foster care and family surveillance in the US: a quantitative overview of contemporary system contact”. Children and Youth Services Review 

Accomplishments:

• Grantee - “The durable impacts of historical racial institutions on contemporary family policing”. Rutgers Center for Politics and Race in America. 2023.

• “Understanding sources of American Indian and Alaska Native inequality in child welfare system outcomes”. Casey Family Programs. Role: PI with Theresa Rocha-Beardall. 2022.

• “Guaranteed Income Experiment: Child Protection Outcomes.” Redlich Horwitz Foundation. Role: Co-I with Zoe Bouchelle; Amy Castro and Stacia West PI. 2022-2025

How Do Social and Racial Justice Concerns Appear in Your Work?

My work explores the causes and consequences of the social distribution of state violence. One set of projects draws attention to child protection systems as key sites of state violence and racial stratification. This work shows that American child protection systems are tightly intertwined with carceral and welfare policy systems, and that racism and settler colonialism play a central role in explaining the spatial and social distribution of family separation. A second set of projects uses novel data and methods to provide detailed statistical analyses of the prevalence and distribution of police violence in the US.

Dr. Kayla Preito-Hodge  is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology, Anthropology, and Criminal Justice at Rutgers University-Camden. She earned her Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of Massachusetts-Amherst. Her dissertation, “Too Black for the Blue’s” was supported by the National Science Foundation’s Graduate Research Fellowship Program. Dr. Preito-Hodge’s research and teaching explore the intersections of race, policing, organizations, and the larger criminal justice system. Her work has been featured in journals such as Social Currents, Socius, and Psychology of Violence. Additionally, her work has been supported by various internal and external funders. Dr. PH is currently working on a book manuscript that critically examines Black police officers in the era of the Movement for Black Lives. Dr. Preito-Hodge also holds a bachelor’s degree in sociology from Boston College. She is an avid supporter of criminal justice and juvenile justice reform.

Publications & Speaking Engagements

Publications:

• Kayla Preito-Hodge. (2023). Behind the badge and the veil: Black police officers in the era of Black Lives Matter. Psychology of Violence. https://doi.org/10.1037/vio0000462

• Kayla Preito-Hodge., & Tomaskovic-Devey, D. (2021). A Tale of Force: Examining policy proposals to address police violence. Social Currents, 8(5), 403-423. https://doi.org/10.1177/23294965211017903

• Roscigno, V. J., & Kayla Preito-Hodge. (2021). Racist cops, vested “blue” interests, or both? Evidence from four decades of the general social survey. Socius: sociological research for a dynamic world, 7. https://doi.org/10.1177/2378023120980913

Media Appearances/Speaking Engagements:

• Invited Presenter, 125 Years of The Philadelphia Negro: Urban Sociology After DuBois, American Sociological Association (2023)

• 2023, Podcast Interview. “Black Cops-the balance of blue culture and Black lives matter” Voice America https://www.voiceamerica.com/episode/142735/black-cops-the-balance-of-blue-culture-and-black-lives-matter

• Presenter, "The Philadelphia Negro 125 years later:" American Society of Criminology (2023)

Organizations/Accomplishments/Upcoming Projects

Previous Organizations: 

• Center for Urban Research and Education

Accomplishments:

• Chancellor’s Assistant Professor Research Grant

• Princeton University Press Supporting Diverse Voices Proposal Development Grant

• Arnold Ventures Grant for "Prison Identification Project"

Upcoming Projects:

• Prison Identification Project

• The Police Funding Debate: Examining policy proposal

• Stop Snitching: Examining youth perceptions and behaviors on social media in the age of digital surveillance

 How Do Social and Racial Justice Concerns Appear in Your Work?

Concerns of social and racial justice are central to my work on policing. I utilize various racialized and organizational theories to critically examine, unpack, and challenge systemic inequities in policing. Through the lens of Black officers, I explore the ways race, identity, and organizational expectations intersect within law enforcement, highlighting the difficulty of implementing and sustaining organizational and social change as it relates to demographic diversity in policing. Additionally, my work explores how police funding contributes to police outcomes (i.e., crime, violence). Other projects critically examine how state policies and practices, as related to vital documents access for prisoner release, supports prisoner reentry. Through innovative frameworks and data-driven analyses, my research aims to inform equitable public safety practices and amplify marginalized voices within the criminal legal system.

Dr. Benjamin Justice is Distinguished Professor of Education at the Rutgers Graduate School of Education and an associate member of the History Department at Rutgers—New Brunswick. He holds a courtesy appointment as Senior Research Scholar at Yale Law School. He also serves series editor of New Directions in History of Education, at Rutgers University Press. Dr. Justice is past president of the History of Education Society, and a former member of the Standing Committee on American History for the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP).

Currently, Dr. Justice examines the ways in which the US criminal justice system educates. This work builds innovative connections between legitimacy theory and curriculum theory, positing that criminal justice is, itself, a form of civic education. Dr. Justice spend the 2023-24 academic year as a visiting scholar at the Russell Sage Foundation, writing a book on how experiences with police, courts, and pre-trial detention offer formal and hidden curricula that shape civic identity.

Over his career, Dr. Justice has produced scholarship that is wide-ranging and interdisciplinary, appearing in journals in education, history, law, social science, and philosophy, as well as in mainstream periodicals, radio, and tv. His book, The War That Wasn’t: Religious Conflict and Compromise in the Common Schools of New York State, 1865-1900, provides a social history of the micropolitics of religion in public schools. In Have a Little Faith: Religion, Democracy, and the American Public School (coauthored with Colin MacLeod), he looks at tensions between public education and democratic ideals from historical and contemporary perspectives. He is also editor of The Founding Fathers, Education, and the Great Contest, which examines educational ideas in the early American Republic, and the methods by which historians uncover them.

Dr. Justice is the winner of numerous honors and awards, such as the AESA Critics Choice Book Award, the Outstanding Scholarly Publication on Justice in Education Award from the AERA Philosophical Studies in Education SIG, the AERA Outstanding Reviewer Award, A National Academy of Education/Spencer Post-Doctoral Fellowship, the Woodrow Wilson Foundation’s Charlotte Newcombe Dissertation Fellowship, the NY State Archives/NY Department of Education/State University of New York Researcher of the Year, and awards in service, teaching, and research from Rutgers University and the Graduate School of Education.

Dr. Justice holds a B.A. (history) from Yale, and M.A. (history) and Ph.D. (Education) from Stanford University.

Publications & Speaking Engagements

Publications:

• Benjamin Justice, Essay Review: “Public vs. Private: The Early History of School Choice in America, by Robert N. Gross. New York: Oxford University Press, 2018. American Journal of Education. (February 2019): 289-293.

• Benjamin Justice, “Toward a Jurismythos of Thomas Jefferson: The Supreme Court’s Use and Abuse of America’s Most Controversial Founder” in Brian Dotts and Andrew Holowchak (eds.) The Elusive Thomas Jefferson: Essays on the Man Behind the Myths. (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland Publishers, 2017): 46-68.

• Benjamin Justice and Colin Macleod, Have a Little Faith: Religion, Democracy, and the American Public School (Chicago: University of Chicago Press). 220 pages. 2016.

Media Appearances/Speaking Engagements:

• Featured Guest "The Future of Urban Education" on State of Affairs with Steve Adubato. New York and New Jersey Public Television, March (multiple dates) 2018. http://www.pbs.org/video/social-reforms-can-ignite-change-failing-school-districts-vp/

• Boston Public Radio (WGBH), "82-Year-Old Law Requires Mass. Taxpayers to Fund Private School Transportation," Interview with Bianca Toness, aired Sept. 4, 2018.

• Featured Guest, "Should religions be a part of America's public school system?" Joy Cardin Show. Wisconsin Public Radio, Monday, Feb 20. http://www.wpr.org/shows/should-religions-be-part- americas-public-education-system

Organizations/Accomplishments/Upcoming Projects

Previous Organizations: 

• Stanford University 

• Board of Directors, History of Education Society

• Editorial Board, Theory and Research in Education

Accomplishments:

• Big Ten Academic Alliance Academic Leadership Fellow, Rutgers University

• Council for the Support and Advancement of Education (CASE) Circle of Excellence Gold Award – Winner for Rutgers: a 250th Anniversary Portrait (contributing author)

• Finalist for How the Criminal Justice System Educates Citizens, Spencer Mid-career Grant

Becoming an Expert Witness: Perspectives from a Psychologist and an Attorney | Monday, April 28, 2025, 12:00 p.m.-3:15 p.m.

REGISTER NOW

This webinar training session is being provided by the Rutgers Graduate School of Applied and Professional Psychology (GSAPP) in partnership with Rutgers Law School

Professional psychologists have broad-based training in the science and practice of psychology. Specialized training in assessment and treatment of mental health problems, knowledge of assorted psychological constructs ( e.g., memory), and knowledge of psychometric considerations underlying the measurement of constructs results in psychologists being of significant utility to the courts. Being an expert witness demands specialized knowledge and training that is rarely offered in doctoral and post-doctoral education and training. Participants in this seminar will learn the role and functions of a psychological expert witness and how non-forensic practice differs from forensic practice as an evaluator and potential expert witness. Information about the assorted court systems (Federal vs assorted state courts; criminal, civil, and family courts) will be presented as will considerations for effective expert witness testimony across court systems and jurisdictions. This joint presentation by a psychologist and an attorney is intended to provide a balanced perspective on the fundamentals of expert witness testimony.

Instructor Bios

Daniel Bromberg, Ph.D., ABPP, is the Director of Special Psychological Services, LLC, Newtown, Pennsylvania (previously located in Bloomfield, New Jersey). He is licensed to practice psychology in several states and is Board Certified by the American Board of Professional Psychology in Behavioral and Cognitive Psychology. Dr. Bromberg provides a range of assessment and treatment services regarding issues of childhood maltreatment and has a special interest in working with individuals who exhibit sexual behavioral problems. In New Jersey, he has testified as an expert witness in both family and criminal court matters and has been deposed in civil matters regarding alleged “psychological injury” resulting from child sexual abuse. Dr. Bromberg has co-authored peer-reviewed journal articles on matters of child protection and has co-authored and co-edited several books about adolescents and adults who engage in problematic sexual behaviors.

Jason Kanterman is a trial lawyer and litigator at Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson LLP where his practice focuses on representing individuals and institutional clients in affirmative and defensive litigation across a diverse range of industries and disciplines.Clients routinely seek Jason's counsel in matters involving sophisticated business disputes, securities litigation, intellectual property litigation, whistleblower and False Claims Act litigation, class actions and multidistrict litigation, constitutional rights litigation, insurance-related disputes, transportation and logistics disputes, and employment matters. Jason also conducts investigations and counsels clients in pre-suit strategy and alternative dispute resolution. Jason has tried several cases to verdict, regularly argues dispositive and non-dispositive motions in state and federal courts throughout the country, and has represented clients in successful appeals before state and federal appellate courts including the US Supreme Court. A true generalist operating on both side of the aisle, Jason has helped secure judgments for his plaintiff-side clients exceeding $100 million and has helped his defense-side clients avoid equally significant exposure. Jason also maintains an active public interest practice, regularly representing both individual and institutional clients in impact litigation, civil rights litigation, and voting rights litigation throughout the country. For example, Jason was appointed lead counsel in a federal civil rights case by a United States District Court Judge for the District of New Jersey, an engagement that resolved favorably for his client by way of confidential settlement. Jason also currently serves on the steering committee for a consolidated federal voting rights litigation in United States District Court for the Western District of Texas. And he also represents parties in federal criminal actions through the Criminal Justice Act panel for the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. In 2021, Jason was selected as a "New Leader of the Bar" by New Jersey Law Journal, which recognizes attorneys under the age of 40 who have left an indelible mark on the legal community and bring both notable achievements and outstanding potential to the table. In 2023, Jason was elected as a Trustee of the Association of the Federal Bar of New Jersey and currently serves as the Young Lawyer Chairperson for that organization. When not actively litigating, Jason serves as an Adjunct Professor of Law at Rutgers Law School where he teaches litigation skills courses including deposition practice and trial advocacy. A frequent lecturer and writer, he regularly presents continuing education courses and authors law review articles, invited essays, and book chapters on litigation-related topics. Prior to joining Fried Frank, Jason practiced at a boutique litigation firm.

Rutgers-Newark School of Criminal Justice 50th Anniversary Event featuring David Kennedy | Monday, April 14th 2025, 10:00-11:30 AM

SCJ-GSA presents an interactive presentation with David Kennedy, chair of the National Network for Safe Communities and the inspiration for Kevin Bacon's character in the Showtime series "City on a Hill"

The Rutgers Institute for Law and Philosophy presents the Bloustein Lecture in Law and Ethics | Wednesday, April 16, 2025, 4:00 p.m

The Institute for Law and Philosophy at Rutgers Law in Camden is hosting its annual Bloustein Lecture in Law and Ethics on Wednesday, April 16, at 4pm in room E112. Professor Sophia Moreau will deliver the lecture titled, “Systemic Discrimination and Structural Injustice.” Moreau is the Samuel Tilden Professor of Law, with an Associated Appointment in Philosophy, at New York University. Her work involves both legal scholarship (in discrimination law and social justice tort theory) and philosophical scholarship (on a variety of questions in legal, moral and political philosophy).