Nicole Westmarland is Professor of Criminology at Durham University where she is also the Director of the Durham Centre for Research into Violence and Abuse (CRiVA). She has conducted many research and consultancy projects in the field of domestic and sexual violence.

Her books include ‘Violence against Women’ (Routledge, 2015), ‘Researching Gender, Violence and Abuse: Theory, Methods, Action’ (with Hannah Bows, Routledge, 2018). Her most recent book is ‘Men’s Activism to End Violence against Women’ (with various co-authors, Policy Press, 2021) and is free to download as an e-book.

In recent years a number of her publications have been around domestic violence perpetrator interventions, and in 2019 she was awarded the COMPASS award in the US for her domestic abuse perpetrator work. The award panel noted the work “has significantly guided and expanded efforts to protect survivors through advancing and evaluating accountable perpetrator intervention research and programming”.

As a Co-Investigator of the Vulnerability & Policing Futures Research Centre, Nicole will contribute to the ongoing direction of the Centre and co-lead the research on domestic abuse and vulnerabilities. This will look at how ‘vulnerabilities’ are understood and applied to victim-survivors of domestic abuse but also people who use violence and abuse against their partners and/or ex-partners. The work will draw upon the ongoing advances in police responses to domestic abuse in Victoria, Australia and Manchester, England.