Martin Rettenberger

Prof. Dr. Martin Rettenberger is the Director of the Centre for Criminology (Kriminologische Zentralstelle – KrimZ) in Wiesbaden, Germany, and is Professor at the Department of Psychology at the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU), Germany. Since 2021, he is President elect of the International Association for the Treatment of Sexual Offenders (IATSO) and editor of the open access journal “Sexual Offending: Theories, Research, and Prevention” (SOTRAP). He has published more than 250 research articles, book chapter, and books about risk assessment, sexual and violent offending, and about several other aspects and topics in criminology and forensic psychology. Martin Rettenberger studied psychology at the University of Regensburg, Bavaria, and at the Free University of Berlin as well as criminology at the university of Hamburg. Between 2006 and 2010 he worked at the Federal Evaluation Centre for Violent and Sexual Offenders (FECVSO) in the Austrian Prison System and at the Institute for Violence Research and Prevention in Vienna, Austria. His responsibilities included writing risk assessment reports for sexual and violent offenders for the Austrian prison system and for correctional service courts as well as different research projects in the field of criminology, forensic psychology and psychiatry. Together with Reinhard Eher, head of the FECVSO, he translated and investigated commonly used risk assessment instruments such as the Sex Offender Risk Appraisal Guide (SORAG),the Static-99, or the Spousal Assault Risk Assessment Guide (SARA). Furthermore, they developed an actuarial risk assessment instrument for imprisoned violent offenders for the Austrian Prison System. In 2009 he finished his doctorate in human biology at the Institute of Forensic Psychotherapy at the Ulm University, Germany, about standardized risk assessment instruments in different sexual offender subgroups. Between 2010 and 2013 he worked as a postdoctoral research fellow at the Institute of Sex Research and Forensic Psychiatry headed by Peer Briken at the University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf, Germany, and as a risk assessor for the prison system and for criminal justice courts. In 2013 and 2014 he was associate professor for forensic psychology at the Department of Psychology at the Johannes Gutenberg-University Mainz, Germany. Since 2015, he is the Director of Centre for Criminology in Wiesbaden, Germany. Martin Rettenberger serves since 2012 as secretary vice general of the International Association for the Treatment of Sexual Offenders (IATSO) and as coeditor of the IATSO e-journal Sexual Offender Treatment.