Denis Abels’ research primarily focuses on penal law. This area encompasses various aspects of substantive criminal law and the law of criminal procedure, such as sentencing and prison law. Significant developments can be distinguished in the area of Dutch penal law (e.g. as regards conditional release, minimum sentences and the introduction of new sanctioning modalities) and in the international and European legal contexts (e.g. cooperation in the execution of sentences, developments as regards the bindingness and content of human rights prison standards and the penal law of international criminal tribunals).

As a full professor at the UvA, Abels will in particular focus on international penal law. His research will address the establishment of standards by a multitude of international supervisory and law-making institutions and the needs and possibilities for achieving more synergy between them. In addition, he will examine developments as to the bindingness of international penal norms and how these developments relate to the effectiveness of international and European penal cooperation. Abels teaches at the Bachelor’s and Master’s level in the fields of substantive and criminal law and the law of criminal procedure, with a special focus on criminal sanctioning law.  

About Denis Abels

Abels has been affiliated with the UvA’s Faculty of Law since 2007 and was appointed associate professor in 2013. He is chair of the Criminal Law department and honorary judge at the district court of Noord-Holland.

Abels has been involved in various national and international research projects, most recently in the projects ‘Evaluating the Public Prosecution Service Settlement Act’ and ‘Simplification of Suspicion Criteria’, commissioned by the Dutch Research and Documentation Centre (WODC). His previous research focuses on punishment and detention at international criminal tribunals and on the international standardisation of the execution of sentences.

Abels is a member of the editing board of the journal ‘Sancties: Tijdschrift voor straffen’ and a permanent author for the journal ‘Delikt and Delinkwent’.