Bellis earned his PhD in public administration at the University of Southern California in 1977,[REF] taught at Long Beach City College and later at UCLA and USC.
He authored "Heroin and Politicians: The Failure of Public Policy to Control Addiction in America" (Praeger, 1981);[REF] and "Hotel Ritz - Comparing Mexican and U.S. Street Prostitutes: Factors in HIV/AIDS Transmission" (Routledge, 2003)[REF] .