Benoit Leclerc

Building on 20 years of research on how offenders operate, Dr Benoit Leclerc is an international recognized leader on crime script analysis. He is leading the theoretical advancements of crime scripts and its translation to end users worldwide. Regularly invited to national and international speaking events on crime scripts (e.g., Switzerland, Canada, Australia), he led several funded research projects using crime script analysis in Australia and Canada and currently leads this field on the significance of publications. Most recently, in collaboration with the Australian Centre to Counter Child Exploitation (ACCCE) and other Australian police agencies, he was the lead chief investigator of a project funded by the Australian Institute of Criminology on child sexual exploitation online.

Dr Leclerc has worked in the field of sexual offenders for now 20 years. He has been involved in sexual offenders’ treatment programs at the Montreal Philip-Pinel Institute (i.e., maximum security psychiatric institution in Canada) for over 7 years. He was responsible for conducting risk and phallometric (i.e., sexual deviance) assessments of adolescent and adult sexual offenders. In research, he has led various projects in the field with the Correctional Services of Canada, specialized treatment centres for sexual offenders in Canada as well as the Australian Corrective Services and police organisations. In addition, based on his experience and expertise, he has developed and facilitated emotional intelligence/resilience training seminars for correctional staff and professionals working with sexual offenders.

Dr Leclerc serves on the editorial board of many journals including, Sexual Abuse: A Journal of Research and Treatment, arguably the leading international journal on sexual offenders and sexual offences.