Frances Crook
Frances Crook OBE is the Chief Executive of the Howard League for Penal Reform, the oldest penal reform charity in the United Kingdom.
University and Beyond
Frances Crook graduated in history from Liverpool University, and subsequently qualified as a teacher, working in secondary schools in Liverpool and London until 1980.
She was the campaigns co-coordinator at the British Section of Amnesty International from 1980 to 1985, and was twice elected as a Labour Councillor for East Finchley in the London Borough of Barnet, serving from 1982 to 1990, leading on housing and planning and holding weekly surgeries.
The Howard League for Penal Reform
Appointed in 1986, she has been responsible for the Howard League's research programmes and campaigns to raise public concern about issues including suicides in prison, the over-use of custody, poor conditions in prison, young people in trouble and mothers in prison. Under her direction the number of staff and turnover of the charity has grown twenty-fold. The charity has secured a contract with the Legal Services Commission to provide legal advice to children in custody and has taken a number of successful judicial reviews that have improved the treatment of children and young people in custody and on release.