Personal Statement
I joined the School of Law and Social Justice in Autumn 2017, having previously taught at LJMU since 2009. I am director of the Feminist Legal Research and Action Network (FRAN) and EDI Deputy (Law). I'm Equity and Trusts module co-ordinator and adopt a feminist approach to both my teaching and research.

My research adopts a socio-legal perspective and, to date, my research interests have generally focused on the intersection of gender and the criminal law, with a particular focus on the criminalisation of women who themselves have been subject to domestic abuse. Having engaged with feminist contributions to critical animal studies and having previously taught animal law my second area of research interest is legal responses to animals, and specifically companion animals. To this end I am currently Co-Investigator on a project entitled 'Legal Governance of Dog Rescues: Addressing Post-Pandemic Challenges in a Period of Austerity' which seeks to investigate the role responsive regulation can play in increasing the resilience of animal rescue establishments across the UK

Find a Supervisor

I am very happy to hear from potential postgraduate research students about supervising projects in the following areas:

> Gender, sexuality and law, particularly socio-legal responses to mothers/ motherhood.

> Law and policy responses to animals.

> Feminist perspectives on criminal law.

Research Overview
My research centres around two areas of feminist scholarship

1. Feminist responses to criminal law.
- To date my research has sought to generate new perspectives on legal approaches to women who fail to protect their children from harm. I draw upon feminist theory (primarily vulnerability and care scholarship) and utilise empirical research methods to explore the criminalisation of women who have themselves been subject to abuse.
- I am also working on a project which evaluates the partial defence of loss of control alongside colleagues Professor Anna Carline, Dr Matthew Gibson and Dr Laurene Soubise (University of Leeds)

2. Socio-legal responses to animals
- I am currently working alongside co-investigator Professor Marie Fox as well as Battersea, the Kennel Club and A-Law to interrogate the different regulatory models animal rescues are subject across the devolved administrations of the UK.