Dr. Tara O’Connor Shelley is Professor and Director of the Institute on Violence Against Women and Human Trafficking in the School of Criminology and Criminal Justice and Strategic Studies at Tarleton State University. Dr. Shelley received her Ph.D. in Criminology and Criminal Justice at Florida State University and her MS in Justice, Law and Society from the American University. She previously worked as an Associate Professor and Co-Director of the Center for the Study of Crime and Justice (CSCJ) in the Department of Sociology at Colorado State University. Prior to joining academia, Dr. Shelley worked for the Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE), the Police Executive Research Forum (PERF), and the Justice Research and Statistics Association (JRSA). Dr. Shelley has over 29 years of professional research and evaluation experience involving 30 federal, state, local and privately funded research grants. During her career, Dr. Shelley has worked with well over 60 international, federal, state, and local criminal justice agencies on assorted projects. Her work has led to over $1.5 million in external funding for research and evaluation projects. She has 42 technical reports related to the results of her evaluation research, has co-edited two books, and has authored over 43 journal articles, book chapters, and magazine/newsletter articles. Dr. Shelley has recently published in Feminist Criminology, Rural Sociology, Social Forces, and Policing: An International Journal of Police Strategies and Management. In 2020, Dr. Shelley received the University Faculty Excellence in Scholarship Award and the prestigious designation of Fulbright Scholar from the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, U.S. Department of State.