Biographies

Michael Connelly is currently Administrator of the Evaluation & Analysis Unit of the Oklahoma Department of Corrections. He previously served as executive director of sentencing commissions in Maryland and Wisconsin as well as research director for the Oklahoma sentencing commission. He has also managed grant projects for the Justice Research and Statistics Association and been an associate professor of public policy and administration for Southwestern Oklahoma State University as well as adjuncting for the University of Maryland and Norwich University. His research has appeared in policy, political science, education, criminal justice, and sentencing journals as well as in government publications.

Kim Steven Hunt is the Executive Director of the District of Columbia Sentencing Commission, an independent agency of local government. In his present position, Dr. Hunt and his staff conduct empirical analysis of sentencing, and develop policy recommendations on issues such as structured sentencing and offender re-entry for the District of Columbia. The District of Columbia is currently implementing sentencing guidelines as a two-year pilot project to be revisited in December 2006, and the Sentencing Commission staff is actively monitoring the new system.

Dr. Hunt has over fifteen years of experience in the field of criminal structured sentencing policy. He previously worked on sentencing reform efforts in Maryland and Virginia. At Virginia’s Criminal Sentencing Commission, he led research teams in the studies of sentencing guidelines, risk assessment, and the development of computer simulation models to project the impact of sentencing policy on prison populations. At Maryland, he directed the study of the judicial sentencing guidelines, resulting in the creation of the State Commission on Criminal Sentencing Policy in 1999. He is a former chairman of the National Association of Sentencing Commission’s Executive Committee, and continues to be active in NASC. He attained his doctoral degree in political science from the University of Kansas in 1987. Until 1997, he was adjunct professor of public policy at Virginia Commonwealth University. In 2000 and 2001, he was special adjunct professor for the University of Maryland’s criminology department.