Center on Public Safety & Justice

Driving evidence-based public safety and justice interventions.

NORC’s Center on Public Safety & Justice develops actionable, evidence-based solutions to crime and victimization. Those insights empower decision-makers to make criminal justice systems fairer and more effective and to inform community-level responses beyond policing and incarceration. When social systems are frayed, the Center fills an unmet need for trustworthy, non-partisan data collection and rigorous, transparent analysis and evaluation.

The Center integrates our multidisciplinary team of experts in criminology, demography, economics, and public health and NORC’s industry-leading survey data collection capacity. Our holistic approach and longstanding partnerships with diverse local stakeholders in the hardest-hit communities allow us to identify programming innovations at every societal level.

Center Leads

John Roman

Director

roman-john@norc.org

Asheley Van Ness

Associate Director

vanness-asheley@norc.org

Center on Public Safety & Justice Experts

John Roman

Director
Asheley Van Ness

Associate Director
Audra K. Grant

Senior Research Scientist
Jeanette Hussemann

Principal Research Scientist
Kareem Kysia

Program Area Director
Weiwei Liu

Principal Research Scientist
Carrie E. Markovitz

Program Area Director for Youth Research
Elizabeth Mumford

Senior Fellow
Shannon Nelson

Senior Research Director
Genevieve Ray

Senior Research Director
Alicia Tabliago

Senior Research Director
Bruce Taylor

Senior Fellow

“Crime and violence rose dramatically in 2020 and then declined just as quickly in 2023. Policy responses should account for both the sudden increase and the sudden decline. The explanation that best fits the data is that COVID-19 caused disruptions to people’s daily lives and the programs that support them.”

John Roman

Director, Center on Public Safety & Justice

“Crime and violence rose dramatically in 2020 and then declined just as quickly in 2023. Policy responses should account for both the sudden increase and the sudden decline. The explanation that best fits the data is that COVID-19 caused disruptions to people’s daily lives and the programs that support them.”

Source: Testimony to U.S. House of Representatives

“As the U.S. justice system is becoming more aware of the need to provide increased protections for youth, reforms are being passed to provide youth access to legal counsel prior to arrest. Through our recent research, we outline best practices for jurisdictions who are considering implementing reforms in the future.”

Jeanette Hussemann

Principal Research Scientist, Center on Public Safety & Justice

“As the U.S. justice system is becoming more aware of the need to provide increased protections for youth, reforms are being passed to provide youth access to legal counsel prior to arrest. Through our recent research, we outline best practices for jurisdictions who are considering implementing reforms in the future.”

“Our study shows that investing in resilience training and wellness programs may help lessen the impact of stress on police officers’ well-being, job satisfaction, and performance, which may be of interest to administrators and policymakers striving to retain a high-performance police workforce.”

Weiwei Lu

Principal Research Scientist, Public Health

“Our study shows that investing in resilience training and wellness programs may help lessen the impact of stress on police officers’ well-being, job satisfaction, and performance, which may be of interest to administrators and policymakers striving to retain a high-performance police workforce.”

Our Expertise

Discover Our Research

Making justice and public safety efforts fairer and more effective requires subject matter expertise and trustworthy data and analysis.

NORC Introduces Unique Center on Public Safety & Justice

NORC Article

NORC launched its Center on Public Safety & Justice just as voters said yes to significant prison labor, drug policy, and prosecutorial reforms at the ballot box.