Susan Leahy

Susan Leahy, BCL, LLM, PhD (UCC), is a professor in the School of Law. Susan's primary research interests lie in the areas of criminal justice (with particular emphasis on sexual violence and victims of crime) and family law (specifically domestic abuse and marriage). Her PhD research was funded by the Irish Research Council for the Humanities and Social Sciences. Her thesis was entitled The Rules and Realities of Consent in Irish Sexual Offences Law: Perspectives on Reform and examined the rules relating to consent in Irish sexual offences legislation. She has published her research on sexual offences, victims' rights and family law in both national and international journals including the Common Law World Review, the International Journal of Evidence and Proof, the Journal of Criminal Law, and the Child and Family Law Quarterly. She has co-authored two books: Sexual Offending in Ireland: Laws, Procedures and Punishment, (Clarus, 2018) (with Dr Margaret Fitzgerald-O'Reilly) and The Victim in the Irish Criminal Process (Manchester University Press, 2018)(with Prof Shane Kilcommins, Dr Kathleen Moore-Walsh and Prof Eimear Spain). 

Susan has completed a number of funded research projects on sexual offences, gender-based violence and victims of crime. Her funded research includes a 2021 report, The Realities of Irish Rape Trials: Perspectives from Practice, which was funded by the Irish Research Council and conducted in partnership with Dublin Rape Crisis Centre. This research involved interviews with Irish legal professionals and court accompaniment workers who work within Irish rape trials. She is currently the PI on a COALESCE funded project: Lived Realities: Victim-Survivors' Experiences of Irish Sexual Offence Trials. 

Susan lectures in Criminology, Family Law and Media Law. She completed a specialist diploma in Teaching, Learning, and Scholarship at UL in 2014. She is the director of the LLM/MA in Human Rights in Criminal Justice and Director of the Centre for Crime, Justice and Victim Studies (CCJVS).

Susan is co-founder and co-director (with Dr Eithne Dowds, QUB) of the All-Ireland Network for Sexual Violence Research (AINSVR), an all-island research network of researchers and stakeholders who work in the area of sexual and gender-based violence. 

Susan teaches Media Law (LA4013 and LA5021), Family Law (LA4038), Family Law Online (LA4081) and Criminology (LA6052). She completed a specialist diploma in Teaching, Learning and Scholarship in 2014. Susan has a keen interest in legal pedagogy and has organised workshops on legal pedagogy involving national and international experts on law teaching in UL (2014 and 2016). Susan has co-authored (with Professor Shane Kilcommins and Dr Eimear Spain) a chapter on criminal law pedagogy which was published in Gledhill and; Livings (eds), The Teaching of Criminal Law: The pedagogical perspectives (Routledge, 2017). Susan has supervised a number of Advanced Lawyering projects for 4th year Law Plus students. These projects have focused on family law issues (e.g. the Child and Family Relationships Act 2015 and domestic abuse legislation) and victims' rights (e.g. rights of victims of sexual offences and of families of victims of homicide). Partners on these projects have included ADAPT Domestic Abuse Services, OneinFour, Advic, Dublin Rape Crisis Centre and Sexual Violence Centre Cork.