Rob Allen is director of the International Centre for Prison Studies at King’s College London. (www.prisonstudies.org).  Prior to joining ICPS in March 2005, he ran Rethinking Crime and Punishment, an initiative set up by the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation to change public attitudes to prison and alternatives.(www.rethinking.org.uk)

Rob was previously director of research and development at Nacro, the UK’s largest non- governmental organization concerned with crime and criminal justice. He was a member of the Youth Justice Board for England and Wales from 1998 to 2006 and is currently Chairman of CLINKS, the umbrella group for the criminal justice voluntary sector. He has written widely on crime and punishment including “Children and Crime - Taking Responsibility” for the Institute of Public Policy Research. He recently co-edited a book of essays on the National Offender Management Service called “Reshaping Probation and Prisons”, published by Policy Press.

Rob has undertaken criminal justice and prison reform work in 14 countries, with a particular emphasis on juvenile justice and alternatives to prison.  


Christy Visher, Ph.D., Principal Research Assistant, Urban Institute, Washington, DC


Marc Mauer, Executive Director, The Sentencing Project, Washington, DC


Chua Chin Kiat, Director, Singapore Prison Service
"The Singapore Prison Service and Our Rehabilitation Efforts"

Mr Chua Chin Kiat is the Director of the Singapore Prison Service. He graduated with First Class Honours in his Bachelor of Science (Computer and Mathematics) degree from the University of Aston in 1975. He is one of the few recipients of both the President’s Scholarship and Singapore Armed Forces Scholarship. Mr Chua has previously held key appointments in the Singapore Ministry of Home affairs Headquarters (Director, Operations) and the Singapore Police Force (Director, Manpower; Director, Operations; and Director, Criminal Investigation Department). He joined Singapore Prison Service on November 1, 1998. Together with his officers, Mr Chua crafted a new Vision and revised the Mission Statement. In the shared vision, Prison Officers set themselves the goal of being Captains in the lives of offenders and aspire to steer offenders to become responsible citizens. Mr Chua was awarded the International Management Action Award (IMAA) in 2002 in recognition for his exceptional ability in taking management action to achieve sustainable, tangible results for an organisation, society or nation. In 2005, Mr Chua was awarded the Public Administration Medal (Gold), one of the highest honours conferred to a public servant. Last year, he led the organisation to attain the Singapore Quality Award (SQA), the most prestigious award conferred on organisations that demonstrate the highest standards of business excellence. The SQA is based on universally accepted standards that are also found in the US Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award, the European Quality Award and the Australian Business Excellence Award.

The Honorable Elijah E. Cummings, Congressman, 7th District, State of Maryland

Greg Pease, Executive Director, Gastineau Human Services, Juneau, Alaska

Ted Conover, Author, Newjack: Guarding Sing Sing

Ted Conover is the author of four books of nonfiction, including New Jack: Guarding Sing Sing, An account of his ten months spent working as a corrections officer at New York's Sing Sing Prison.  Newjack won the National Book Critics Circle Award in 2001 and was a finalis for the

Pulitzer Prize. A summa cum laude graduate of Amherst College (1981) in anthropology, Conover

 spent two years at Cambridge University as a Marshall Scholar (1982-1984).  In 2001, he

 received an honorary doctorate from Amherst and in 2003, a Guggenheim Fellowship.  In recent

 years he has taught at the Bread Loaf Writers Conference, Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of

 Government, and the University of Oregon.  A contributor to publications including The New York

Magazine, The New Yorker, The Atlantic Monthly and National Geographic, he is presently Distinguished Writer in Residence at the Department of Journalism at New York University.