Nancy Ryba Panza

Background

About Nancy Ryba Panza

Please view my personal webpage: nancyrpanza.weebly.com As a psychologist, I most enjoy working with law enforcement officers and attorneys who deal directly with offenders who are mentally ill. These interests take me down two very different paths - one in which I work with judges and attorneys by doing psycho-legal evaluations of offenders; and the other in which I work with law enforcement officers who have the difficult task of handling encounters with individuals who present with a wide variety of mental health concerns. In my work with the courts, I perform evaluations of competence to stand trial and competence to waive Miranda rights, evaluations of mental state at the time of offense (insanity defense, diminished capacity), sentencing evaluations, and risk assessments. I've worked within both state and federal systems and with adult and juvenile offenders. In my experiences with law enforcement, I've worked with departments to provide pre-employment psychological evaluations as well as fitness-for-duty evaluations. I have provided psychological services for law enforcement officers in terms of promoting overall personal and family health, dealing with personal and organizational stress, providing critical incident debriefing, and treating Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). I've also provided education and training workshops with academy recruits, newly promoted sergeants, Emergency Services/SWAT and Hostage Negotiation teams to aid these officers in successfully handling encounters with mentally ill individuals. I am a Professor in the Department of Psychology at Cal State Fullerton and I have a small private practice. I am licensed to practice psychology in California and New York. I am available for educational workshops and speaking engagements for interested groups.