Recall backers take first step
Petition against Judge Persky expected to begin circulating in area in August
After vowing for the past year to recall the Santa Clara County judge who gave a lenient sentence to former Stanford athlete Brock Turner for sexually assaulting an unconscious, intoxicated woman, organizers Monday made their pledge official.
About 35 people gathered as the campaign filed a notice of intent to recall Superior Court Judge Aaron Persky with the county registrar of voters, some holding signs with slogans such as “Soon to be unemployed. Aaron Persky” and “Recall Aaron Persky. Enough is enough.”
The campaign also submitted a scathing 198-word statement branding the judge as an apologist for rapists and batterers.
If the statement is approved by the county registrar of voters, it will appear — along with a response by Persky — on petitions that proponents plan to begin circulating in August.
Recall proponents must collect 58,634 valid voter signatures within a 160-day period ending in January to qualify the measure for the June 2018 countywide ballot. The campaign, spearheaded by Stanford law professor Michele Dauber, has already hired a firm to help collect signatures. Dauber is a friend of the victim’s family and a longtime activist against campus sexual assault.
The judge, who has not commented on the uproar over the Turner sentence, could not immediately be reached Monday.
But a key supporter, District Attorney Jeff Rosen, noted Monday that the case has already had a significant impact, including his successful effort to get a state law passed requiring a prison term for sexual assault of an unconscious or intoxicated person. Rosen said he has also tried to raise national awareness by organizing a campus sexual assault symposium and crafting a ground-breaking protocol on how colleges and law enforcement handle such assaults.
“Judge Persky’s sentence in that case was wrong, in my opinion, but he had the right to give it,” Rosen said in a written statement. “My focus as we move forward is less about an individual judge than it is to the victims of campus sexual assault.”
According to the statement signed by 50 elected officials, Stanford professors and leaders of women’s rights groups, including San Jose Vice Mayor Magdelena Carrasco, “Santa Clara County residents deserve a judge who will protect victims — not rapists,” the statement says. It also claims that Persky, “a former Stanford athlete, has a long history of awarding lenient sentences to athletes and upper-class defendants for sex crimes and violence against women.”
Persky was transferred to civil court at his own request last summer. But recall proponents note he still could potentially preside over civil lawsuits alleging sexual assault.
Other signatories included Jillian McNerney, cofounder of Electing Women Silicon Valley; San Jose City Councilman and former police officer Raul Peralez; Palo Alto Councilman Cory Wolbach; and Viera Whye, artistic director of San Jose’s Tabia African American Theater Ensemble.
The judge now has seven days to submit his up to 198word response.
Turner was convicted in June of sexually assaulting an intoxicated, unconscious young woman in 2015 outside a campus fraternity party, after two cyclists caught him in the act.
Prosecutors asked Persky to sentence Turner to six years in state prison. But Persky, who followed a probation department recommendation in handing down Turner’s sentence last June, opted for jail, plus three years of probation, noting under California law Turner also will have to register as sex offender for the rest of his life. Turner served three months in jail and has moved back to his hometown in Ohio.
Katherine Spillar, cofounder of the Feminist Majority and executive editor of Ms. magazine, told the crowd at the registrar of voters’ office that county residents not only have the right to recall Persky, “They have a duty” to send a message to the “entire justice system” across the country, she said.
“Silicon Valley is where women are going to say enough is enough,” Spillar said.
Civil rights leader and former Santa Clara County Superior Judge LaDoris Cordell disagrees with the sentence, but opposes the recall.
“Without discretion, we are left with cookie cutter justice that imposes mandatory sentences without any regard to defendants’ circumstances,” she said. “We’ve been there before, and the results are far more damaging than the occasional ill-advised sentence.”
If the recall qualifies, voters also will have a chance on the same ballot to immediately pick his replacement, just as they did when they ousted Gov. Gray Davis in 2003 and chose Arnold Schwarzenegger to replace him out of 134 other candidates.
Any lawyer in California may run for judge; there is no requirement in judicial races that candidates must live in the county.
If the recall qualifies and Persky loses, whoever gets the most votes would serve out the rest of Persky’s sixyear term, ending in 2022. The winner needs only a plurality of the votes, not a majority.
So far, only one candidate is weighing whether to run for Persky’s seat has surfaced: assistant district attorney Cindy Hendrickson, an executive in Rosen’s administration. Hendrickson supports the recall.
Dauber said Monday that proponents have raised $450,000. By the end of 2016, Persky had raised $64,618, according to his latest campaign finance report. The next statement is not due until midsummer.
Two judges have been recalled in California, in San Francisco in 1913 and Los Angeles in 1932. The first judge had reduced bail for felony assault of a teenage girl.
Dauber predicted the campaign’s biggest challenge would be managing what she said has already been a huge outpouring of support and offers by volunteers to collect signatures.
Persky’s backers include dozens of law school professors in California, including UC Irvine’s Erwin Chemerinsky and Santa Clara University’s Gerald Uelmen.
The professors, including 11 who teach at Stanford, are opposed to the proposed recall on the grounds that the sentence was lawful and dovetailed with a probation officer’s recommendation.
Persky’s ouster, they wrote, would cause great harm, because judges may well feel pressured into making decisions based on public opinion. Other groups, including the California Judges Association, have issued similar statements expressing concern about judicial independence.
County officials are still conducting research but have said it would cost slightly more than $1.1 million to put the recall on the June 5, 2018, ballot, far less than the $6.8 million cost of holding a special countywide election in November.
However, recall proponents believe it would cost half that, and are still negotiating with the county on the issue.