Dr. Hesterman is a published author and retired Air Force colonel who served in three Pentagon tours and in multiple command positions in the field. Her last assignment was Vice Commander at Andrews Air Force Base, Maryland, where she led installation security, including the protection of Air Force One. She is the recipient of the Legion of Merit, the Meritorious Service medal with 5 oak leaf clusters and the Global War on Terrorism Service medal.

Dr. Hesterman currently serves as a senior consultant with Group Nine Risk Consulting, a firm specializing in security risk management, asset protection, and security training. After her military retirement in 2007, Dr. Hesterman also worked as a cleared contractor in Washington, DC performing operational research on international and domestic terrorist organizations, transnational threats, organized crime, human, drug and weapon trafficking, and the terrorist and criminal exploitation of the Internet. She was recently the security lead on a 3-year contract to deploy security best practices within the Department of Transportation. In addition to providing assessments for houses of worship, schools, shopping venues, airports, banks, stadiums and businesses, Dr. Hesterman designs and instructs graduate level security courses for the Defense Counterintelligence and Security Agency, Department of Defense. She advises the Homeland Security Training Institute at the College of DuPage in Chicago, the Crisis Response Journal and three DHS Centers of Excellence. She is on the ASIS technical committee for the first-ever School Security Standard and is the Chair, International Guidelines and Standards for Space Analogs.

An academic author for the Taylor & Francis Group, Dr. Hesterman’s book Soft Target Hardening: Protecting People from Attack was the ASIS Security Industry Book of the Year for 2015. The second edition was the ASIS Security Industry Book of the Year for 2019, and the Social Sciences Book of the Year for Taylor & Francis. She also authored Soft Target Crisis Management (2016) and The Terrorist-Criminal Nexus (2013), as well as 33 journal and magazine articles. She holds a doctoral degree from Benedictine University, Master of Science degrees from Johns Hopkins University and Air University, and a Bachelor of Science degree from Penn State University. In 2003, she was a National Defense Fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C. where she studied the terror-crime nexus; her resulting book, Transnational Crime, and the Criminal-Terrorist Nexus, won the Air Force Research Award for 2004. She is a 2006 alumnus of the Harvard Senior Executive Fellows program and was a senior fellow at the Center for Cyber and Homeland Security at George Washington University from 2016-2018.

Dr. Hesterman is a sought-after public speaker, with over 90 keynote, guest speaking and training events in the U.S. and abroad for ASIS, FBI, DHS, DoD, state and local law enforcement, Fortune 100 companies, Major League Baseball, and numerous associations.

Education: 

• Ed.D. Higher Education and Organizational Change, Benedictine University, Lisle, IL; 2014
• Senior Executive Fellow, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA; 2006
• National Defense Fellow, Center for Strategic and International Studies, Washington DC; 2003-2004
• Air War College, Yearlong Seminar, the Pentagon; 1999-2000
• M.S. Military Operational Art/Science, Air Command and Staff College, Maxwell AFB, AL; 1999
• M.S. Applied Behavioral Science (Organizational Development), Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD; 1995
• B.S. Geography (Remote Sensing and Political Geography), Penn State University, PA; 1986

Services: 

• Expert Witness Reports
• Document Analysis
• Expert Testimony
• Response to Opposition Statements
• Assistance with Preparing Questions for Depositions

Certifications:

• Situational Awareness Specialist, Advanced Practitioner, Level 2 Instructor