During one week at the People’s Police Academy, Professor introduces students to contemporary issues in criminal justice such as: current and historical concepts of criminal justice, interrelationships among different components of the system, and the role and function of the justice system in society. Specific topics in which are included in the course are: Police and Crime Control; Defining the criminal justice system; Contemporary Policing Issues; Prosecution and Courts; Sentencing; Corrections; Restorative Justice/Community Corrections; Juvenile Justice; Drugs and Crime; Terrorism and Policing.

Gary LaFree is Professor of Criminology and Criminal Justice and Director of the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START) at the University of Maryland. He received his PhD in Sociology from Indiana University in 1979. During 2005-2006 Dr. LaFree served as President of the American Society of Criminology (ASC). Dr. LaFree was named a Fellow of the American Society of Criminology in 2006 and a member of the National Academy of Science's Committee on Law and Justice in 2008.

Professor Gary LaFree said coming to Vietnam for the first time, he is deeply impressed with curriculum of the class amd appreciates the students’ efforts in learning and participating in the class. He believed that, with those efforts, the students would successfully completed the program.

Professional Master’s Degree Program in Justice Leadership between the PPA and the University of Maryland with the permission from Vietnam Ministry of Education and Training and the sponsor of Program 165 has been carried out on March 4th, 2011 and is expected to graduate in October 2012. Before that, the students will have chance to visit the campus in the U.S. in one month time.