Speakers

Ms. Nichanee Wongba is a Mekong Regional Legal Advisor for the American Bar Association Rule of Law Initiative. She has experience in supporting the activities under the Regional Anti-Corruption Advisor (RACA) Program focusing on international cooperation against corruption and transnational organized crime in Southeast Asia causing from many forms of corruption, and Transnational Anti-Money Laundering Assistant Programs (TAMLA) focusing on anti-money laundering mechanisms, in particular, disrupting ML through gambling in SEA and training to leverage big data analytics to identify ML and sanction evasion.

She formerly worked as a Legal Specialist for the USAID Wildlife Asia Program where her work involved counter wildlife trafficking, illicit trade of natural resources in the region, as well as Counter Transnational Organized Crime. Her background covers program development and implementation, researching legal and governance topics relevant to the ASEAN region.

Dr Louise Porter is Associate Professor in the School of Criminology and Criminal Justice at Griffith University, Australia, and member of the Griffith Criminology Institute. Her research applies social psychological and criminological perspectives to behaviour in policing and offending contexts. Her current research on policing focuses on police misconduct and police use of force. She has worked with law enforcement agencies both in Australia and overseas on a range of projects for more than a decade, holding previous academic appointments at the University of Liverpool and University of Birmingham in the UK, and within the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence in Policing and Security at Griffith University.

Dr Kelly Hine is a policing researcher in the School of Law and Society at the University of the Sunshine Coast (USC). Prior to joining USC, Dr Hine was a lecturer at the Australian National University after obtaining her doctorate from Griffith University. Dr Hine’s areas of expertise include police misconduct and integrity. In addition, her research specialises in front-line policing, particularly, the use of force by police, the dangers of policing (including injuries and fatalities to both officers and citizens), policing major crises, and the use of technology by police. Her research has implications for the way researchers examine policing practices and interactions, the way officers are educated and trained, and the policies and procedures that guide officers.

Leah Ambler recently joined the Australian Commission for Law Enforcement Integrity (ACLEI) as Director of Corruption Prevention. She manages a team to support agencies within the Integrity Commissioner's jurisdiction to address corruption risks and vulnerabilities that come to ACLEI's attention. The team develops targeted corruption prevention tools, based on benchmarking of good practices and manages ACLEI's participation in national and international anti-corruption fora.

Prior to joining ACLEI, Leah was a legal analyst in the OECD’s Anti-Corruption Division, the Secretariat to the OECD Working Group on Bribery. Leah managed the Asia Pacific Anti-Corruption Initiative and undertook evaluations of countries’ implementation of the OECD Anti-Bribery. Leah has advised countries on legal and institutional reforms to combat corruption, enhance the independence of law enforcement agencies and protected reporting persons. Leah has a background in law.

Jae Ik Jeong is an INTERPOL NCB Seoul Officer at the Korean National Police Agency.

His work in recent years spans international cooperation and financial investigations on behalf of the Seoul Metropolitan Police. Mr Jeong has on-the-ground policing experience in both Seoul and Gyeongnam. He has an educational background in police laws.

Mr. Nirut Sukphoka is a Legal Divisional Director, Bureau of Legal Affairs, at the Office of the National Anti-Corruption Commission of Thailand.

He has experience in inquiry as a Senior Professional Level. He has experience in investigating various cases under the responsibility of the NACC, such as the removal of political officeholders, and cases in which government employees are suspected of malpractice.

In addition, he has experience in drafting various laws proposed to the ONACC's Commissioners, the National Legislative Assembly of Thailand, Office of the Council of State, such as the Organic Act on Supplementing the Constitution Relating to the Prevention and Suppression of Corruption, (as amended by (No.4) B.E. 2559 (2016)), as well as giving opinions on legal matters to the sub-committee of the Law and Regulations to the Council of State and other government agencies.

Assoc. Prof. Pol. Lt. Col. Dr. Krisanaphong Poothakool

Associate Professor Police Lieutenant Colonel Dr. Krisanaphong (Tong) Poothakool is the Assistant to the President and the Chairman of the Faculty of Criminology and Justice Administration at Rangsit University. In addition, he has been invited by different government agencies as well as local and international NGOs to work as Special Expert in Criminology and the Research Committee for the Ministry of Justice (MOJ), the Committee of drafting Drug Law for the Office of Narcotics Control Board (ONCB), the Domestic Violence Committee for PM’s Office, the consultant of OZONE Foundation Thailand and the consultant of the Association for Prevention of Torture (APT) in Switzerland, Board member of the Association of the Royal Police Cadet Academy as well as the Country Focal Point for Global Law Enforcement and Public Health (GLEPH) in Australia.

Currently, he has been asked to deliver the lecture to many organizations at local and international level. These include RTP, RPCA, MOJ, ONCB, UNODC, UNDP, IOM, the Ministry of Public Health as well as law enforcement agencies in Asia, Europe and the US. Further, he has been invited by media to give the ideas of criminological aspects and police reform in various circumstances locally and globally.

Manuel T. Soriano, Jr. was admitted to the Philippine Bar in 1991. He joined the Office of the Special Prosecutor, Office of the Ombudsman in 1998, holding various positions – the latest of which is Deputy Special Prosecutor.

He headed the special panels which conducted the preliminary investigations of certain high-profile cases, such as the anomalous purchase of second-hand helicopters by the Philippine National Police (PNP) and the ghost repairs of V-150 Light Armored Vehicles, also by the PNP.

At present, he heads the Cluster I of the Office of the Special Prosecutor composed of Prosecution Bureaus 1 and 6 and the Appellate and Special Actions Bureau.

Atty. Cabras is the Assistant Ombudsman at the Office of the Ombudsman of the Philippines.

Prior to her appointment, she had the opportunity to work for all three branches of the Philippine government: the Judiciary as a Court Attorney, the Department of Labor and Employment in various capacities, as technical writer and consultant for members of the House of Representatives, and the academe as an Instructor at the University of the Philippines National Center for Public Administration and Governance.

Aside from her current position, Atty. Cabras has been a member of the Faculty of Law of the Adamson University since 2007 and the New Era University since 2012, and a lecturer for the Philippines’ Mandatory Continuing Legal Education program since 2016.

Peter Ritchie is the Regional Anti-Corruption Adviser at the American Bar Association (ABA) Rule of Law Initiative.

Peter has led and supported many capacity building projects focusing on international cooperation against corruption, money laundering and transnational crime. In this role, he also co-designed and hosted major APEC programs on transnational crime and corruption, in partnership with the Philippines (2015), Peru (2016) and Vietnam (2017), and implemented anti-corruption projects throughout South-East Asia.

Earlier in his career, Peter was a Senior Analyst in the Office of Strategic Crime Assessments, focusing on transnational crime in the Asia-Pacific region. He produced various criminal intelligence assessments on transnational crime for the Australian Government, using both classified and open-source intelligence.

Francesco Checchi has more than 15 years of experience working on good governance, public administration reform and anti-corruption. Mr Checchi is currently the UNODC Anti-Corruption Regional Adviser for Southeast Asia.

Mr Checchi’s work focuses on providing support to Member States of the UN Convention against Corruption for implementation of the Convention. He provides expert advice and input to the development and implementation of technical assistance programmes in anti-corruption at the regional and national levels of Southeast Asia and the Pacific.

Previously Mr Checchi worked as Anti- Corruption Specialist at the UNDP covering Eastern Europe and Central Asia; he collaborated with several NGOs on democratic governance and human rights related issues.

More about his team's work can be found here.