He earned his doctorate from the College of Criminology and Criminal Justice at Florida State University. His research interests include the spatial patterning of crime, criminological theory, quantitative methods and juvenile justice. A second major area of his current work focuses on the factors believed to have impacted crime rates during the last 30 years, both in the U.S., and cross-nationally. He currently teaches CJBA110, CJBA210, CJBA240, CRJ70400 and CRJ716 at John Jay. He is also the chief methodologist at the Research and Evaluation Center at John Jay and is a member of the doctoral faculty at The Graduate Center.