Hannah Quirk has worked at the University of Manchester since 2005. Her research interests in are mainly in criminal justice and criminal evidence. She worked as Senior Researcher at the Legal Services Research Centre (the research unit of the Legal Services Commission), and as a Case Review Manager at the Criminal Cases Review Commission, investigating claims of wrongful conviction and sentence.
In 2005, she spent six months on a research sabbatical at the Innocence Project New Orleans, before joining the Law School at Manchester. She has been a visiting scholar at the University of Melbourne, Queen's University Belfast (both 2009) and Fordham University Law School (2012).
She has been an executive member of the Socio-Legal Studies Association, organising its 2008 Annual Conference. She was a member of the Independent Monitoring Board and has been a Council of Europe Expert, delivering training on human rights for judge candidates in Azerbaijan. She was a member of the Bar Standards Board Qualifications Committee and the AHRC Peer Review College.
Dr Quirk is a member of the Criminal Law Review Editorial Board. She is currently a director of South Manchester Credit Union and sits on the Executive Board of Justice and the University of Manchester's Legal Advice Centre Advisory Board.