Rate My Professor William Moreto

William Moreto is an associate professor of criminal justice and Graduate Program Director in the Department of Criminal Justice at the University of Central Florida's College of Community Innovation and Education. He joined UCF in 2013 as an assistant professor, earning tenure and promotion to associate professor in 2019. Moreto holds a Ph.D. in Criminal Justice from Rutgers University (2013), a B.A. in Criminology from Simon Fraser University (2008), and an A.A. in Criminology from Kwantlen Polytechnic University (2005). Earlier in his career, he served as a research assistant and part-time lecturer at Rutgers University, contributing to projects on public security and conservation crime science. He is a Faculty Fellow at UCF's Center for Global Economic and Environmental Opportunity and a Research Associate at the Rutgers Center for Conservation Crime Science.

Moreto's research focuses on environmental criminology and crime science, particularly wildlife crime, conservation rangers, situational crime prevention, policing innovation, and the illegal wildlife trade's intersections with corruption and other crimes. He has conducted fieldwork in protected areas across Uganda, Kenya, Nepal, and the Philippines, informing initiatives on ranger safety, community relations, and wildlife conservation. His seminal book, Wildlife Crime: From Theory to Practice (Temple University Press, 2018), advances theoretical and practical approaches to the issue. Notable peer-reviewed publications include "Poaching in Uganda: Perspectives of Law Enforcement Rangers" (Deviant Behavior, 2015), "Corruption within the illegal wildlife trade: a symbiotic and antithetical enterprise" (British Journal of Criminology, 2018), "Wildlife crime: a conceptual integration, literature review, and methodological critique" (Crime Science, 2017), and "Occupational stress among law enforcement rangers: Insights from Uganda" (Oryx, 2016). Moreto's scholarship has amassed over 2,400 citations on Google Scholar. He has secured over $1.2 million in funding from organizations such as the World Wildlife Fund, Global Wildlife Conservation, International Ranger Federation, and Orange County Sheriff's Office. As a consultant for WWF and USAID projects, he has shaped global strategies for ranger perceptions, wildlife trafficking assessments, and crime prevention frameworks. In 2018, he received an Honorable Mention for UCF's International Researcher Award from the College of Health and Public Affairs.