Dr. Louise Shelley, Founder and Director

Dr Shelley is the founder and Director of TraCCC, and a leading expert on transnational crime and terrorism. She is a Professor in the School of Public Policy at George Mason University.

Dr. Shelley received her undergraduate degree cum laude from Cornell University in Penology and Russian literature. She holds an M.A. in Criminology from the University of Pennsylvania. She studied at the Law Faculty of Moscow State University on IREX and Fulbright Fellowships and holds a Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of Pennsylvania. She is the recipient of the Guggenheim, NEH, IREX, Kennan Institute, and Fulbright Fellowships and received a MacArthur Grant to establish the Russian Organized Crime Study Centers. In 1992. she received the Scholar-Teacher prize at American University, the university's top academic award.

She is the author of Policing Soviet Society (Routledge, 1996), Lawyers in Soviet Worklife and Crime and Modernization, as well as numerous articles and book chapters on all aspects of transnational crime and corruption. She is also an editor (with Sally Stoecker) of Human Traffic and Transnational Crime: Eurasian and American Perspectives. She serves on the boards of Demokratizatsiya: the Journal of Post-Soviet Democratization, and the European Journal on Criminal Policy and Research, Global Crime and The International Annals of Criminology. She was elected to the Board of Directors of the International Society of Criminology for the years 1999-2004. Her expertise in transnational crime and corruption includes money laundering and illicit financial flows, human smuggling and trafficking, national security issues, and the use of information technology by international crime groups.

Since 1995, Dr. Shelley has run programs in Russia, Ukraine and Georgia with leading specialists on the problems of organized crime and corruption. She has also been the principal investigator of large-scale projects on money laundering from Russia, Ukraine and Georgia and of training of law enforcement persons on the issue of trafficking in persons. She has testified before the House Committee on International Relations Committee, the Helsinki Commission, the House Banking Committee and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on transnational crime, human trafficking and the links between transnational crime, financial crime and terrorism. She has spoken at various international fora and at many universities both in the United States and abroad on transnational crime and corruption. Additionally, she appears on television and radio, including appearances on CNN, NPR's Marketplace, PBS, A&E, the History Channel and 60 Minutes.

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Irina Morozova, Executive Director for International Programs

Ms. Morozova joined TraCCC in June 2003 as a Program Associate, served as a Program Manager for TraCCC's programs in Russia from February 2004-February 2006, and became Executive Director for International Programs in February 2006.

Before joining TraCCC, Ms. Morozova assisted Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty's Russia Bureau, conducted research for the International Center for Research on Women and served in the United Nations' Division for the Advancement of Women in New York. Ms. Morozova received a BA in English and German from Pyatigorsk State Linguistic University in Russia and an MA in Gender Studies from the Central European University in Budapest, Hungary.

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Karen Saunders, Senior Program Officer/Researcher

Karen Saunders joined TraCCC in 1998 and has served as a Program Assistant, a Program Manager and Executive Director for International Programs.

Her prior work experience includes Russian-language project work for the International Monetary Fund, management and ownership of a small Russian-English translation firm, contractual work in Washington, DC and Moscow for the agribusiness and packaging industries, and marketing promotions management for a large joint-venture corporation in Moscow.

Ms. Saunders holds a Master’s Degree in International Development from American University. She received her B.A. cum laude in International Relations and Russian Language and Literature from Tufts University. She was selected to spend one academic year in St. Petersburg and Moscow in 1993-94 to participate in a specialized language fluency program. Ms. Saunders has traveled extensively in the countries of the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe.