Kirsten Engels is a Detective Superintendent with a career spanning 25 years and three police jurisdictions. She is currently leading Project Freya that is focused on the reform of the Northern Territory Police Force’s operational response to incidents of domestic and family violence. Project Freya is also intrinsically involved in the current landmark series of coronial inquests into the domestic violence related homicides of four Aboriginal women in the Northern Territory. 

In November 2022, Kirsten implemented the Family Harm Coordination Project in Alice Springs as a pilot project to provide enhanced oversight over the initial police response to domestic violence in Alice Springs and the surrounding remote communities. 

Kirsten has an investigative background, primarily within the child abuse, sex crimes and domestic violence fields, developing and delivering the current vulnerable persons interviewing course to police investigators.

Kirsten is currently based in Alice Springs having served in South Auckland, South East Queensland, Cape York, Katherine and Darwin.