In 2009, the Willem Pompe Institute for Criminal Law and Criminology hosted an annual conference - for PhD-researchers working at Dutch universities in the field of criminal justice - on the theme of "shifting responsibilities in criminal law." This volume consists of the elaborated and actualized versions of the presentations by researchers at the conference, complemented with further contributions of others invited for this purpose. The book"s editors asked senior-researchers in the field to contribute by writing substantial comments on different PhD-contributions. The result is a valuable scientific volume on a highly relevant topic, dealing with criminal law, criminal procedure, and administration of justice. The book reflects not only the quality of junior scholarly research in the area of criminal justice in the Netherlands, but it also provides insight in the current research programming in this area.