Dr Harriet Pierpoint is a Reader in Criminology and Criminal Justice at the University of South Wales. She has undertaken a number of funded research projects including for the Youth Justice Board, Home Office, Ministry of Justice and the National Offender Management Service Cymru and has publications in internationally recognised, peer reviewed journals, such as Policing and Society: An International Journal and Criminology and Criminal Justice: The International Journal. 

As a criminologist, my work involves teaching, and research and publishing, particularly around criminal process and vulnerable people. In recent years, I’ve also become interested in animal abuse.

I am driven by a desire to see people and animals treated equally and fairly. My research can help by highlighting circumstances or processes where this is or isn’t the case.

I am currently working with the St Giles Trust Cymru on an evaluation of their Through the Gates Resettlement Service.

St Giles is funded through charitable trust The Waterloo Foundation and works in conjunction with HMP Cardiff to provide support, advice and guidance to prisoners and ex-offenders. The support is provided by caseworkers, with the assistance of volunteers and peer advisors who are prisoners and ex-offenders themselves.

The final report is due later this year, but it is already clear that there are a number of aspects of the project that are working well, such as its relationships with other support services and organisations and the training of peer advisors.

I am also working with fellow criminologists Dr Jenny Maher (of USW) and Dr Piers Bierne from the University of Southern Maine on an edited book on animal abuse, the International Handbook on Animal Abuse Studies, to be published by Palgrave MacMillan.