The Bellwether Collaborative
for Health Justice
The Research Team
Lab Director
Lauren Brinkley-Rubinstein, PhD
Lauren Brinkley-Rubinstein is an Associate Professor of Population Health Sciences at Duke University. She conceptualizes the criminal legal system as a structural determinant of health that impacts people, families, and communities. She co-founded the COVID Prison Project and has used this infrastructure to launch the Third City Project--a big data project that tracks and collects publicly available health and health policy data from carceral systems. Other recent work focuses on substance use, HIV prevention, and underscoring how mass incarceration is an integral facet of structural racism.
Lauren Brinkley-Rubinstein, PhD
Lab Director
Lab Manager
Sarah Morgan, MSW
Sarah Morgan is the Bellwether Collaborative for Health Justice Manager. She graduated from UNC in 2009 with a B.A. In Psychology and English. She completed her social work training in 2012 at the UNCG/NCATSU Joint Masters of Social Work Program. Sarah has worked in clinical research for nearly 10 years. Broadly, her research interests include the impact of early adverse childhood experiences on developmental trajectories throughout the lifespan of the individual.
Sarah Morgan, MSW
Lab Manager
Policy Analyst, 3rd City Project
Forrest Behne, BS
Forrest Behne is a policy analyst at the Bellwether Collaborative for Health Justice. He was incarcerated for nearly two years because of a little-understood medical condition. Since being released through clemency by Ohio’s governor, he is inspired to help those affected by the criminal-legal system. He speaks at universities, for non-profits, and with lawmakers about his experiences and was a core member of the COVID Prison Project leadership. His research interests now include carceral policies, health inequities, and the collateral consequences of incarceration
Forrest Behne, BS
Policy Analyst, 3rd City Project
Graduate Research Assistant, SPECS
Hannah Camp, BA
Hannah Camp is currently a grad student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, getting her Master's in Public Health and Social Work. Prior to going back to school, Hannah worked in women's and reproductive health advocacy and sexual assault hotline support in Washington, DC. Her research interests and passion revolve around trauma and adverse childhood experiences and how they impact sexual and reproductive health equity.
Hannah Camp, BA
Graduate Research Assistant, SPECS
Recruitment & Retention Specialist
Breana Castonguay, MPH
Breana Castonguay began her public health career as a community organizer in Fresno, California. The experience inspired her to obtain a Master’s in Public Health at The George Washington University with a focus on Community Oriented Primary Care. In graduate school, a Health Disparities course introduced her to the crack and cocaine sentencing disparities and mass incarceration policies. Her research interests are inspired by these unjust policies and include working with people living with HIV in the criminal justice system and PrEP as prevention.
Breana Castonguay, MPH
Recruitment & Retention Specialist
Project Coordinator, PIERS
Alice Cates, MS
Alice Cates is site coordinator of the JCOIN PIERS study at the Bellwether Collaborative for Health Justice. She received her bachelor degrees from the University of Texas at Austin in 2005 and a M.S. in epidemiology from the University of Texas Health Science Center - Houston School of Public Health in 2008. Alice has worked in public health research for over 10 years in Texas, the District of Columbia, and North Carolina. Her research interests include HIV/AIDS and the health disparities affecting populations involved in the criminal justice system.
Alice Cates, MS
Project Coordinator, PIERS
Research Assistant, 3rd City Project
Anvi Charvu
Anvi Charvu is a sophomore from Apex, NC, and is a prospective Sociology and Biology major. Anvi is the co-president of Duke Remote Area Medical and is a member of Lady Blue, an all-female acapella group. Through an ongoing Bass project, she researches socioeconomic and geographical barriers to healthcare in rural areas. She hopes to further her knowledge of the intersection between health, healthcare, and incarceration through the Re-Envisioning Health & Justice Lab.
Anvi Charvu
Research Assistant, 3rd City Project
Jasmine is an undergraduate senior at Duke University pursuing a BA in Environmental Science Policy. She is pursuing two minors, one in African & African American Studies, and the other in Visual Media Studies. Her academic and research interests are focused on environmental injustice and how they intersect with health inequity for marginalized populations.
Jasmine Clairsaint
Research Assistant, 3rd City Project
Research Assistant, 3rd City Project
Jasmine Clairsaint
Jasmine is an undergraduate senior at Duke University pursuing a BA in Environmental Science Policy. She is pursuing two minors, one in African & African American Studies, and the other in Visual Media Studies. Her academic and research interests are focused on environmental injustice and how they intersect with health inequity for marginalized populations.
Jasmine Clairsaint
Research Assistant, 3rd City Project
Project Coordinator, SPECS
Christopher Corsi, BA
Chris Corsi is the Project Coordinator for the SPECS study and former Co-Coordinator of the COVID Prison Project. He graduated from UNC Chapel Hill in 2018 with a B.A. in Psychology. His public health career began in interpersonal violence-prevention and sexual health promotion at the intersection of education, data collection, and project coordination. He has since expanded this work to better understand the interplay of systems across broad health outcomes and how data can be used to shine light on health disparities. His research interests include the social determinants of health and the impacts of trauma.
Christopher Corsi, BA
Project Coordinator, SPECS
Clinical Research Coordinator, RWJF
Zaire Cullins, BA
Zaire is a clinical research coordinator for the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation-funded community safety project. She graduated with BAs in psychology and political science from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 2021. Her research interests revolve around the impact of the criminal legal system on adolescents and families, with a particular interest in mental health and racial disparities.
Zaire Cullins, BA
Clinical Research Coordinator, RWJF
Research Assistant, 3rd City Project
Mac Hoeve
Mac Hoeve is a junior majoring in Economics (BS) and International Comparative Studies (BA) and minoring in Cultural Anthropology. They are interested in the economics of International Development and abolition-focused research. In the future, they hope to attend an economics graduate program.
Mac Heove
Research Assistant, 3rd City Project
Research Assistant, 3rd City Project
Sophia Sparrow
Sophia is a third-year undergraduate student at Duke University who is pursuing a degree in Neuroscience (BS). Her current research interests focus on the health disparities among socially disadvantaged populations across the country and how greater transparency can promote justice in the criminal legal system. Following graduation, she intends to continue working as an EMT before pursuing medical school to serve the community and raise awareness of the ethical responsibilities within the healthcare industry.
Research Assistant, 3rd City Project
Ja'nelle Kellam
Ja'nelle is a junior at Duke University pursuing a major in Neuroscience (B.S.), a minor in Chemistry, and a certificate in Decision Sciences. Her professional interests lie in medicine/healthcare, and she plans on pursuing a medical degree. She has further interest in the intersection of race, gender, and socioeconomic status within social institutions.
Ja'nelle Kellam
Research Assistant, 3rd City Project
Research Assistant, 3rd City Project
Jennifer Lao, BS
Jennifer Lao graduated from UNC Chapel Hill with a BS in Biology and a BA in History. Through her coursework and involvement with on-campus mental health organizations, Jennifer developed research interests in racial health disparities, HIV/AIDS, and mental health reform, particularly in their relation to the criminal justice system.
Jennifer Lao, BS
Research Assistant, 3rd City Project
Graduate Research Assistant
Orobosa Idehen, BS
Orobosa is a Public Health graduate student in the Gillings School of Global Public Health with a concentration in Health Policy and Management. She graduated from the University of Georgia with a BS in Health Promotion and Behavior with a minor in Global Health. She was involved in many qualitative research projects, including the Parents and Children Together (PACT) project and the UGA Flu Study which focused on how exposure to chronic and acute stress is associated with antibody production following vaccination.
In her transition from the urban context of Brooklyn, NY to Gwinnett, GA, and now Durham, NC, Orobosa's lived experiences have made her keen on understanding the implications of inequitable systems on communities, particularly of color. As a health policy student, she hopes to sharpen her skills in research, advocacy, and policy analysis to influence policy that would result in systems change.
Orobosa Idehen, BS
Graduate Research Assistant, PIERS
Graduate Research Assistant
Kate LeMasters, MPH
Kate LeMasters is a doctoral candidate in the Department of Epidemiology in the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health and a predoctoral scholar in the Lifespan/Brown Criminal Justice Research Training Program. She obtained her MPH in Maternal and Child Health at UNC in 2018 and BA in Economics and Global Politics from Washington and Lee University in 2015. In her doctoral program she focuses on social epidemiology, specifically the systems and structures that exacerbate health inequities. She studies mass incarceration and is interested in how this system creates racial health inequities in mental health for those directly involved and their communities.
Kate LeMasters, MPH
Graduate Research Assistant
Research Assistant, 3rd City Project
Sophia Sparrow
Sophia is a third-year undergraduate student at Duke University who is pursuing a degree in Neuroscience (BS). Her current research interests focus on the health disparities among socially disadvantaged populations across the country and how greater transparency can promote justice in the criminal legal system. Following graduation, she intends to continue working as an EMT before pursuing medical school to serve the community and raise awareness of the ethical responsibilities within the healthcare industry.
Sophia Sparrow
Research Assistant, 3rd City Project
Graduate Research Assistant, PIERS
Lilly O'Toole, BS
Lilly O’Toole is a Research Assistant in the Re-Envisioning Health & Justice Lab. She received her B.S. in Public Health from The Ohio State University in 2021 and is currently a first-year MPH student in Health Behavior at the University of North Carolina’s Gillings School of Public Health. Lilly’s interests are ever-evolving but lie primarily within transformative justice, prevention-based healthcare, global health, and health disparities. She hopes to use the social determinants of health to uproot our current capitalist “health” care system and lay the foundation for one based on equity, community, and the biopsychosocial model.
Lilly O'Toole, BS
Graduate Research Assistant, PIERS
Project Coordinator, TCN-PATHS
Madelene Travis, BA
Madelene Travis is a site coordinator of the JCOIN TCN-PATHS study at the Re-Envisioning Health and Justice Lab. She graduated from Colorado College in 2017 with a B.A. in Sociology, with a focus on the sociology of health and medicine. Broadly, her research interests include the social determinants of health, how individuals and families cope with chronic illness, and the intersection between the criminal justice system and opioid use.