FCRG members Dr Hannah Merdian and Danielle Kettleborough (PhD student) recently returned from the annual conference of the National Organisation for the Treatment of Abusers (NOTA) held in Dublin (16-18th Sept 2015).

The conference was very informative, and included a number of high-profile key-note speakers, including Michael Seto (Assessment and Management of Online Sex Offenders), Duncan Sheppard and Mark Blandford (The ARMS Project: Standardising Police Risk Assessment and Management of Sexual Offenders across England and Wales), and Marie Keenan (Restorative Justice and Adult Sex Offenders).

Danielle – who was this year’s recipient of the NOTA research grant – presented initial findings from her PhD in a talk entitled ‘An Application of the Motivation-Facilitation Model to offences relating to Child Sexual Exploitation Material’, which was very well received.

Hannah Merdian, Derek Perkins (NHS West London Mental Health Trust & University of Royal Holloway), Maggie Brennan (University College Cork), and Jon Brown (Head of NSPCC) jointly hosted a consultation session on their International Working Group on Best Practice in the Management of Online Sex Offending, to further the development of evidence-based guidelines on the management and prevention of online sex offending.

Overall, both FCRG members found this year’s NOTA conference to be a great opportunity to network, hear about the latest research findings, – and to learn how to dance a Ceilidh 🙂