Karyn McCluskey

Karyn McCluskey is a Scottish forensic psychologist who is the director of the Violence Reduction Unit.

She was born in Falkirk and grew up in the village of Redding near Polmont. She trained as a nurse and by her late teens worked in Accident and Emergency. She continued to work in nursing while she studied for a BSc in psychology and then a master's in offender profiling.

She worked for the West Mercia Police, before she joined Strathclyde Police as head of intelligence analysis in 2002.

In 2004, the McCluskey was asked to put together a report on how to reduce rates of violence in Glasgow. The contents of report were accepted and this led directly to the VRU being created.

In February 2016 she was appointed to the board of the Scottish Professional Football League (SPFL) as a non-executive director.

In October 2015 she was bestowed with an honorary degree from the Open University.