My primary research focus on the effects of state and police violence for low-income communities, in particular Black communities, and Latinos in the United States.
I have studied the effects of policing and police violence on residents of South L.A. and São Paulo's periphery. I examined how police violence affects residents' racial, spatial identities, their notion of citizenship, and how police construct authoritarian spaces in these areas continuing the subordination and subjugation of Blacks and Latino residents of these two cities.
I argue that the centrality of security and antiblackness have shaped policing in these areas, reproducing the racial and social hierarchical structures in both cities. The work is based on extensive fieldwork conducted in Los Angeles and São Paulo during 2014 and 2015.
My work has been published in the journal of Social Justice, International Studies Perspectives, International Studies Review, as well as chapters in several Handbooks and Edited Books. I am currently working on a book based on my research in Los Angeles and São Paulo
Beyond my work in L.A. and São Paulo, I am interested in studying the ways policing and police violence affect low-income Black people, and other subjugated communities, across Latin America and the US.