Michael Planty leads RTI's Center for Community Safety and Crime Prevention. The Center conducts research, technical assistance, and training across a range of topics related to the prevalence, characteristics, and harms associated with criminal victimization, police and criminal justice response, provision of victim services, and efforts related to crime prevention.
Dr. Planty has led several projects for the U.S. Department of Justice and plays a key role in several ongoing studies related to school safety, incident-based crime statistics, the role of technology in the criminal justice system, and victimization. Before joining RTI in 2017, Dr. Planty served as deputy director at the federal Bureau of Justice Statistics, overseeing multiple national data-collection projects on victimization and law enforcement issues. He has employed both quantitative and qualitative methods in his research and has extensive experience designing studies, developing survey instruments, analyzing data, and disseminating findings. Dr. Planty has published and presented numerous research papers on a wide variety of topics.