LLM Criminal Justice

Criminal justice teaching and scholarship in the School of Law are founded on the reputation and achievements of Sir John Smith, one of the greatest academic lawyers of the twentieth century. Generations of lawyers across the common law world were first introduced to the subject by Smith & Hogan’s Criminal Law.

This enviable tradition is continued today by a notably strong faculty:

• Di Birch is JC Smith Professor of Law and Pro-Vice Chancellor of the University, and contributes to the leading practitioner work Blackstone’s Criminal Practice
• Professor Vanessa Munro holds the Chair in Socio-Legal Studies and has conducted high-profile research in the area of sexual violence, in particular on legal responses to sex trafficking and jury decision-making in rape trials
• Paul Roberts is Professor of Criminal Jurisprudence, specialising in criminal procedure and penal theory, and co-author (with Professor Adrian Zuckerman, of University College, Oxford) of the leading text on Criminal Evidence
• Professor Dirk van Zyl Smit is an expert on prisons and the penal system, and holds the Chair of International and Comparative Penal Law (having for many years previously been Professor of Criminology and Dean of the Law Faculty at the University of Cape Town). In addition to their scholarly research and teaching within the University, all four criminal justice professors are very active in journal editing (e.g. Criminal Law Review, International Journal of Evidence & Proof, Punishment & Society, Criminal Law and Philosophy), and frequently advise criminal justice agencies, policymakers and governments in the UK, the EU, and all around the world.

Course Outline

Criminal Justice teaching at the University of Nottingham adopts a distinctively contextual approach. The LLM gives particular prominence to the theoretical, comparative and international dimensions of criminal process and the penal system. As well as providing substantive information about criminal law and its practical enforcement, the LLM in Criminal Justice encourages students to engage with the methodological foundations of research and scholarship, and to appreciate their implications for penal policymaking and practice. The emphasis is on understanding issues, problems, institutions, processes and cultures of penal law and policy, against a backdrop of ever-increasing globalisation in criminality and law enforcement across national boundaries.

Modules

• Contemporary Criminal Justice Policy in England and Wales
• Counter-terrorism  & International Law
• Criminal Justice and Globalisation
• Fair Trials, Human Rights and Criminal Justice
• Foundations of International Criminal Justice
• Gender, Crime and Criminal Justice
• Human Rights Protection in the UK
• Imprisonment and Human Rights
• International and Comparative Penal Law and Human Rights
• International Consumer Protection
• International Criminal Law
• Philosophical Foundations of Human Rights and Criminal Justice