Management Team
The Management Team of the Virtual Criminal Justice Network consists of researchers from different disciplines who shared longstanding research interests in the use of technology in criminal proceedings, developed independently and prior to the COVID-19 pandemic. Coming from diverse academic backgrounds, the members of the team first met during academic events on remote hearings in 2021. These encounters highlighted the extent to which questions surrounding digitalisation in criminal justice cut across disciplinary boundaries.
Recognising that the complexity of this topic required sustained interdisciplinary engagement, the team decided to establish the Virtual Criminal Justice Network as a hub for bringing together experts from different disciplines. The Network was conceived as a platform for collaboration, exchange, and agenda-setting in research on digital means in criminal proceedings.
The Management Team consists of Carolyn McKay (University of Sydney, Australia), Lisa Flower (Lund University, Sweden), Christina Peristeridou (Maastricht University, the Netherlands), and Dorris de Vocht (Tilburg University, the Netherlands).
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Dr Lisa Flower
Lisa Flower is an Associate Professor in Sociology at the Department of Sociology, Lund University and leads the Qualitative Methods Lab at Lund Social Science Methods Center. Her research expertise focuses on virtual participation and the digitalisation of trials with particular focus on interactions, copresence and virtual justice rituals.
She is currently PI on her ERC Starting Grant “VIRTUTRIALS: The elusive role of physicality in virtual trials - Towards a new understanding of legal participation”, and on a Swedish Research Council-funded project “Trials in Transition: A study of video links in courts”, and is also involved in the EU co-funded E-ViVi project focusing on remote hearings and the use of video-recorded interviews in court. Her most recent book is “The Digital Courtroom: Participation, Attendance, Engagement and Consumption” (Routledge).
Dr. Carolyn McKay
Associate Professor Carolyn McKay is recognised for her research into technologies in criminal justice. She is currently completing an Australian Research Council DECRA: 'The Digital Criminal Justice Project: Vulnerability and the Digital Subject', and finalising a related book manuscript: 'Digital Vulnerability in Criminal Justice: Vulnerable people and communication technologies' (Palgrave Pivot, forthcoming 2025). Her earlier monograph, ‘The Pixelated Prisoner: Prison video links, court ‘appearance’ and the justice matrix’ (Routledge, 2018) was based on her PhD thesis.
At Sydney Law School, Carolyn teaches Criminal Law, Process & Legal Research, and Digital Criminology. She served as Co-Director, Sydney Institute of Criminology 2021-2024; and served on the NSW Bar Association's Media Information Law & Technology Committee 2019-2024. Since 2023, Carolyn has collaborated with international researchers on the Virtual Criminal Justice Network; has been a Visiting Researcher at Radboud University, Netherlands 2023; a Visiting Scholar at the Centre for Socio-Legal Studies, University of Oxford 2019; and a Visiting Scholar 2014 and 2025 at the Oñati International Institute for the Sociology of Law, Basque Country, Spain.
Dr. Dorris de Vocht
Dr. Dorris de Vocht is Associate Professor of Criminal Law at Tilburg Law School where she coordinates the Research program Crime, Criminal Justice and Vulnerability Theory. She has expertise in Dutch, comparative criminal procedure and procedural rights, and has led various international and national projects in those fields. She is co-founder of the Virtual Criminal Justice Network.
Her current research focuses on the impact of digital technologies on criminal justice, in particular how virtual trials and online participation affect fairness, legitimacy and procedural justice. She has published widely on the topic, including recent work on the possibilities and limits of video hearings and remote participation in criminal proceedings. She is currently involved in the EU co-funded E-ViVi project focusing on remote hearings and the use of video-recorded interviews in court. In addition to her academic work, she serves as a substitute judge at the Limburg Court.
Dr. Christina Peristeridou
Dr. Christina Peristeridou is Associate Professor of Criminal Law at Maastricht University and Director of the Maastricht Institute for Criminal Sciences (MICS). A qualified lawyer, she specialises in comparative and European criminal procedure, with a focus on virtual criminal proceedings and human-centred criminal justice. Her research engages with digitalisation, mutual trust, and EU criminal cooperation, including the European Arrest Warrant. She is co-founder of the Virtual Criminal Justice Network (VCJN) and currently leads the NWO-funded project “Beam me up, Scotty! Effective participation in virtual criminal proceedings” (2025–2026).
Her previous and ongoing projects include ImprovEAW (EU-funded), Citius Altius Fortius (WODC), and interdisciplinary research on evidence-based approaches to pre-trial detention. Her work builds on earlier NWO-funded research on the principle of legality, culminating in The Principle of Legality in European Criminal Law (Intersentia, 2015), and later in Comparative Perspectives of Criminal Procedure (Intersentia, 2023, with A. Klip). She has served as former executive editor of the Maastricht Journal of European and Comparative Law, and she is also co-founder and former chair of Female Empowerment Maastricht (FEM).