Jessica Jacobson is Professor of Criminal Justice at ICPR.
Jessica completed her PhD at the London School of Economics in 1996, on the topic of ethnic and religious identities among second-generation British Pakistanis (published by Routledge as Islam in Transition in 1997). Since then she has developed her expertise in criminal justice research, initially as a Home Office researcher, and then as an independent researcher and policy consultant.
Jessica has been based at ICPR since 2011. She was ICPR’s Director from 2013-2024, in which capacity she managed and oversaw the institute’s ambitious and wide-ranging programme of academically-grounded, policy-oriented research on crime and justice.
Jessica has designed and led a large number of funded research projects and published widely on many aspects of justice including prisons, sentencing, and lay participation in judicial proceedings. Her publications include Inside Crown Court: Personal experiences and questions of legitimacy (Policy Press, 2015, with Gillian Hunter and Amy Kirby); Imprisonment Worldwide: The Current Situation and an Alternative Future (Policy Press, 2016, with Andrew Coyle, Helen Fair and Roy Walmsley); and Participation in Courts and Tribunals: Concepts, Realities and Aspirations (Bristol University Press, 2020, co-edited with Penny Cooper). She recently led a three-year project on bereaved people’s experiences of coroners’ inquests, Voicing Loss.
A full list of Jessica's publications is available here