She received her Ph.D. in Justice Studies from Arizona State University. She is the author of more than 30 referred articles and book chapters. Her research interests include issues of organizational climate in the correctional setting; community supervision; prison and jail misconduct; and gender and crime. She has been principal or co-principal investigator on more than a dozen funded projects from local, state and national sources, and recently completed a research project funded by PEW Center on the States examining the effects of earned time credit on successful probation outcomes in Arizona. Her work has appeared in such outlets as Justice Quarterly, Criminal Justice and Behavior, and Criminology and Public Policy.