Professor Dermot Walsh is a law graduate of Queen's University Belfast and a member of the Bar of Northern Ireland. He was awarded a PhD by thesis by the National University of Ireland. Before taking up the chair in law at the University of Limerick he lectured in University College Cork and the University of Ulster. He has served on the National Crime Council, the Irish Research Council for Humanities and Social Sciences and the Committee to Review the Offences Against the State Acts.

His primary research interests lie in the areas of: Policing; Criminal Justice; European Criminal Law and Human Rights. He is the author of leading publications in these areas, including: The Irish Police: a Legal and Constitutional Perspective (1998); Bloody Sunday and the Rule of Law in Northern Ireland (2000); Criminal Procedure (2002) and Juvenile Justice (2005).