Banner with headline
Sarah Esther Lageson, PHD

Sarah Esther Lageson, PHD

Sarah is a sociologist researching criminal legal systems, law, privacy, surveillance, and tech. Most of her research examines the growth of online crime data, mugshots, and criminal records that create new forms of “digital punishment” and has been featured in the New York Times, the Guardian, National Public Radio’s Planet Money, WNYC’s the Takeaway, and other media outlets.

Sarah is an Associate Professor at Rutgers University-Newark School of Criminal Justice, a 2020-2021 American Bar Foundation/JPB Foundation Access to Justice Scholar, and a grant recipient of the National Institute of Justice Early Career Award.

She has written for the Washington Post, Wired, Slate, Vice, The Appeal, San Francisco Chronicle, and The Conversation on issues related to law and tech. 

Her academic research has been published in peer reviewed journals including Criminology, Law and Society Review, Law and Social Inquiry, Punishment & Society, The British Journal of Sociology, and Contexts. Her book, Digital Punishment, was published in 2020 by Oxford University Press and is the recipient of the Michael J. Hindelang award, which recognizes an outstanding contribution to research in criminology.  

She is a former Americorps VISTA volunteer and researcher for nonprofit organizations, and committed to producing scholarship for policy, litigation and public debate. 

Sarah is a proud 3L student at Rutgers Law and recently interned at the New York Office of the Appellate Defender and the New York Legal Assistance Group’s Pro Se Clinic at the Southern District of New York.

Guest Appearances
July 12, 2022

Modern Approaches to Expungement

Legal experts share their perspectives on the expungement process.  In this episode, we’re talking about criminal records – or at least, how to get rid of them. In the U.S. approximately 1/3...