Dr Monika Stempkowski holds master degrees in both law and psychology, which she obtained from the universities of Vienna and Urbino, Italy. During her studies she worked for several years in the field of addiction prevention and treatment before she concluded her education as a clinical and health psychologist. She is also registered with the federal ministry of justice as certified mediator.
From 2012 to 2018 Monika Stempkowski has been working as a researcher or external lecturer at the department of criminal law and criminology at the University of Vienna. Her research focusses on the topics of mentally ill offenders, penitentiary systems, drug crime and victimology. In her doctoral thesis she explores the reasons responsible for the decline of the recidivism rate of mentally ill offenders within the Austrian penitentiary system. Since 2018 she has been leading the research project Successful Tertiary Prevention of Mentally Ill Offenders conducted by the Austrian Association of Psychologists.