Cerian’s research interests lie in financial crime and the wider criminal justice system, including evidence and trial procedure from the eighteenth century to the modern day. Cerian is particularly interested in counter fraud and the prosecution of financial crime, and her most recent publications have included research into fraud within the NHS and wider issues of criminal procedure including criminal disclosure and the use of intercept evidence in criminal trials.

Cerian’s research on contemporary financial crime draws on her legal practice experience as a fraud investigator within the public sector, and includes the leading of a multidisciplinary project into responses to financial crime within the NHS, Strengthening Fraud Responses with the NHS in England. This project reflects Cerian’s passion for working with policy, professional, and lay stakeholders to undertake meaningful research with real-world impact. Outputs of this wider research interest have to date included the delivery of a two-day CPD course on disclosure delivered to counter-fraud specialists across the NHS, and an on-going delivery of courtroom skills training to the Credit Services Association as part of their apprenticeship delivery.  

Cerian is also leading on another impactful research project, Digital Forensics within the criminal justice system: use, effectiveness, and impact. This project brings together a multidisciplinary team to work with the Home Office on their national ‘Impact of Forensic Science Project’. Northumbria’s Digital Forensics project undertook a range of qualitative methods with stakeholders from several police forces, the CPS, national policing bodies, solicitors, barristers, and digital forensics experts, to better understand the way digital forensics impact and influence decision makers through the criminal justice system.

In recent years, Cerian has also acted as the national expert (UK including Gibraltar) on a DG FISMA commissioned project examining national compliance with EU financial sector Directives (specifically, the 4th Anti-Money Laundering Directive).

Cerian also publishes in the field of legal history, particularly on historical responses to financial crime.

Initially graduating in Government from the London School of Economics, Cerian was called to the Bar in 2007 and worked for a number of prosecution agencies including the Serious Fraud Agency, the Financial Services Authority, and the Office of Fair Trading. Cerian taught at Birkbeck College, University of London before taking up a lecturing position in law at the University of Warsaw, and then Lancaster Law School before joining Northumbria Law School.

Cerian was awarded her PhD in 2017, the title of which was ‘Prosecuting Fraud in the Metropolis, 1760-1820’. This thesis was carried out at the University of Liverpool as part of the AHRC funded project, The Digital Panopticon: The Global Impact of London Punishments, 1780-1925.

Cerian leads on a number of impactful projects including one on counter fraud measures within the NHS in England, and one with the Home Office and other stakeholders on digital forensics within the criminal justice system. Cerian also leads on a CPD programme with the Credit Services Association, providing training on their counter fraud apprenticeship course, and is the academic lead member on the national Counter Fraud Professional Awards Board.

From 2017 to 2019, Cerian was a national expert (UK including Gibraltar) on a DG FISMA commissioned project examining national compliance with EU financial sector Directives (specifically, the 4th Anti-Money Laundering Directive)

With a continuing interest in legal history, Cerian is co-editor of the edited collection: English Law and Colonial Connections: Histories, Parallels, and Influences (Routledge, 2023) 

Cerian is currently writing her monograph, Prosecuting London’s Fraudsters 1760-1820: Swindlers, Tricksters and the Law, (Bloomsbury Academic Press, 2024)

Cerian is an Academic Member of Exchange Chambers.