Centre for Rural Regional Law and Justice
Centre staff and Centre Fellows
Director - Richard Coverdale
Richard Coverdale is the founding Director of the Centre for Rural Regional Law and Justice. Before establishing the Centre, Richard worked as a Research Fellow in the School of Law, pursuing research on justice issues for rural communities. His most recent research includes Postcode Justice - Rural and Regional Disadvantage in the Administration of the Law in Victoria and Providing Legal Services to Small Business in Regional Victoria. During his time as Research Fellow he initiated the inaugural National Rural Regional Law and Justice Conference in 2010, opened by the Honourable Robert French, Chief Justice of Australia.
Richard has had extensive experience working in community sector organisations. His community sector experience includes managing an emergency housing service, establishing housing co-operatives and participating in housing policy and tenancy law reform activities. He was also responsible for the establishment of the Geelong Community Legal Service, the first legal service outside metropolitan Melbourne and founded and managed Villamanta Legal Service, a state-wide disability legal service and its publishing and commercial consulting arm, based in Geelong. Prior to joining Deakin University Richard was Director of Publishing with the Victoria Law Foundation, publishing an extensive list of titles including award winning school texts and practical legal guides. He has served on various community Boards and is a founding member of the National Rural Law and Justice Alliance.
Research Fellow - Dr Lucinda Jordan
Lucinda is a Research Fellow in the Centre for Rural Regional Law and Justice. She is currently exploring inequities in the delivery of criminal justice system programs in rural and regional Australia and the impact of this on marginalised communities. Her research interests also include policing and constructions of deviance, and young people's negotiations of space, power and citizenship.
Lucinda recently completed her PhD in Criminology at Monash University. Her doctoral research examined experiences of homelessness, violence and policing on young people's sense of self, place and belonging. Her research highlighted the pervasive presence of violence and policing in homeless young people's lives, and demonstrated how these experiences exclude young people from public and private spaces that are important to them, undermines their sense of belonging as citizens, and violates their own constructions of self and place in the world.
Lucinda has previously worked in research and social policy in the Victorian community sector where she conducted research examining the impact of welfare reform legislation on disadvantaged job-seekers and best practice approaches to youth and family homelessness. She has also worked in research at the Australian Institute for Primary Care and as a counsellor in the not-for-profit sector. Lucinda currently sits on the Board of the Barwon Community Legal Service.
Centre Fellows
Professor Jean Du Plessis - School of Law
Professor Graeme Wines - School of Accounting, Economics and Finance
Professor Louis De Koker - School of Law
Professor Louise Johnston - School of Humanities and Social Sciences
Associate Professor Cindy Davids - School of Law
Associate Professor Samantha Hepburn - School of Law
Associate Professor Peter Kelly - Alfred Deakin Research Institute
Associate Professor Kevin O'Toole - School of Humanities and Social Sciences
Senior Lecturer Wes Obst - School of Law
Lecturer Lidia Xynas - School of Law
Lecturer Michael McShane - School of Law
Lecturer James Farrell - School of Law
