The Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice at the University of Maryland is proud to announce that two of its distinguished faculty members have been recognized in the 2025 Top Law Scientist rankings by Research.com. Gary LaFree, Distinguished University Professor Emeritus, and Peter Reuter, Distinguished University Professor, have both been named among the leading legal scholars globally, reflecting their significant contributions to the field of criminology and criminal justice.

Peter Reuter is ranked 23rd globally and 20th nationally in the law discipline. He holds a D-index of 61 and has accumulated 19,344 citations, reflecting the significant impact of his research. Reuter’s scholarship focuses on drug policy, crime, and illicit markets and has shaped public policy and academic thought alike.

Gary LaFree ranks 35th globally and 32nd nationally. With a D-index of 53 and 10,845 citations, LaFree is widely recognized for his work on terrorism, crime trends, and violence. His contributions have been instrumental in advancing research on global security and justice systems.

Research.com bases its rankings on data from OpenAlex and CrossRef, focusing on the D-index, a discipline-specific H-index that measures scholarly impact based only on publications and citations within a given field. For the law category, more than 2,100 scholars were evaluated from a pool of over 166,000 researchers worldwide.

This recognition highlights the University of Maryland’s continued leadership in criminological and legal research and the profound influence its faculty have on global scholarship and policy development.