Judge Persky was not moved
Amy Goodman talked to Michele Dauber on Democracy Now yesterday.
MICHELE LANDIS DAUBER: So, we are a group of Democratic and progressive women here in Silicon Valley who have come together to put together an actual recall campaign. So there are a number of Change.org petitions online, but those are not the official California recall effort. To participate in that, viewers and listeners should go to RecallAaronPersky.com, where they can sign up for information updates or donate to the effort. And we will be collecting signatures, getting this on the ballot and working to replace him with someone who understands violence against women.
AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about Judge Persky’s handling of the case? Explain what happened in the trial.
MICHELE LANDIS DAUBER: Well, Turner was found guilty, beyond a reasonable doubt, by a jury for three felony sex crimes—two counts of sexual penetration of an intoxicated or incapacitated person, and one count of assault with intent to commit rape. And that’s a very serious charge that has a minimum, as you said, two-year sentence, and is presumptively not eligible for probation or a jail, you know, stay less than that two years; however, the judge really bent over backwards in order to give this defendant a very light sentence.
AMY GOODMAN: In his sentencing, Judge Persky seemed to sympathize with Turner’s assertion the encounter was consensual. He said, quote, “I take him at his word that subjectively that’s his version of his events. … I’m not convinced that his lack of complete acquiescence to the verdict should count against him.” Judge Persky also said, quote, “A trial is a search for the truth. It’s an imperfect process.” He said his sentencing decision took into consideration the defendant had no significant prior offenses, he’d been affected by the intense media coverage, and, quote, “There is less moral culpability attached to the defendant who is … intoxicated.” Judge Persky also said, “A prison sentence would have a severe impact on him. … I think he will not be a danger to others.” Your response, Professor Dauber?
MICHELE LANDIS DAUBER: Yeah, this is the kind of talk that really has outraged the community, I mean, really, across the world, but here in Silicon Valley, in particular. Under the law, the judge had to make a finding in order to grant probation. The state Legislature requires that the judge make a finding that this is a, quote, “unusual” case and that the interests of justice require him to grant probation. And to do that, he found that because he was previously a very successful young man and a good swimmer, you know, with all of these accomplishments as an athlete, and that he was intoxicated, that that would be—make it unusual. And the problem with that is that that basically describes every sexual assault at Stanford.
As has pretty much jumped out at us. Yes, he was drunk, he’s a jock, he said she’d consented, he would dislike state prison – what is unusual about any of that?? The judge might as well have said well clearly this guy is an entitled asshole therefore let’s give him a medal and let him go.
Goodman asked how Stanford had dealt with the whole thing. MLD replied:
And I think it’s important for viewers to understand that Stanford has a long history, really, of not treating these offenses particularly aggressively. For example, up until at least last year, Stanford had only ever expelled one student in the whole history of the university for sexual assault. And they have not, say, for example, as Harvard President Drew Faust has, taken on the fraternity culture of sort of toxic masculinity and the sexual assault that comes along with that, you know, sort of more directly. Harvard has taken some very strong measures against fraternities. And Stanford has—our provost, John Etchemendy, has really not stood up to the fraternities. And I think that, you know, in some ways, you can see that this is the kind of situation that you can end up with when you have a culture of elite, male, athletic privilege.
Which describes the national culture to a great extent. The national culture makes a big deal of male athletics, including violent ones like football, and it grovels to elite males who have privilege. The US is a big frat house in many ways.
Then Goodman reads more of the victim’s statement, and MLD says she found it hard to maintain her composure while Goodman read it.
It’s incredibly powerful. And it really has, I think, caused a lot of women who have been sexually assaulted, or other individuals who someone close to them has been sexually assaulted, to really understand the pain. But I really want your viewers to understand that she—although this has really inspired so many people, she didn’t write it for that purpose. She wrote it for the purpose of persuading the judge, Judge Aaron Persky. And unfortunately, unlike, you know, the millions of people who have been moved around the world, Judge Persky apparently was not moved by this, but was instead persuaded that he needed to have a lot of sympathy and solicitude for Brock Turner.
Which is astounding to me. Just simply astounding.
If you’ll forgive me citing again to Ken White (who usually blogs at Popehat), he wrote what I think is a good article on this case. The whole thing is here but this part I think sums up best what went wrong here:
I’m going with the Hastert Rule on the judge–at this point, I’m assuming that either he, or someone in his peer circle and with his knowledge, used to engage in similar activities. And since he and his peers can’t possibly be ‘rapists’, well, then obviously neither is this kid, right?
This makes me think of this:
A lot of people don’t see forcing a woman to have sex as rape. I think most people think if they didn’t use a weapon (gun or knife, preferably) it isn’t rape. If they know the woman, it isn’t rape. If she isn’t beaten or have broken bones, it isn’t rape. Forced sex isn’t rape because they are merely being alpha and taking the initiative and women want strong men anyway. This is such a ubiquitous comment that I find myself totally in despair that this disgusting idea will ever go away.
Persky ran unopposed in the primary yesterday (yesterday was voting day here in California,) and so he has automatically “won” reelection. His name won’t even appear on the ballot in the general election in November.
I know five months is not much time to mount a campaign but couldn’t someone still run against him? Or would that be against the rules?
Lady Mondegreen,
My understanding is that — putting aside the recall efforts for the moment — it’s too late to run against the judge in the November elections. For everything other than presidential nominations, California has a “top two” primary system. If a candidate is unopposed in the primary, or wins a majority, then he or she wins the election outright. The “general” election in November is effectively a runoff election for contested races where no candidate received a majority — then the top two candidates (regardless of party — this fall’s election for Senate will be between two Democrats) face off.
This judge was unopposed in the primary, which is pretty common — contested judicial elections are the exception rather than the rule here. People can’t get into the race now any more than they can decide to run for Senate now — if you don’t show up for the first round, you can’t jump in later.
That’s the reason behind the recall effort. If they get enough signatures for the recall effort, then a special recall election is held. The recall election ballot would have two parts: recall Judge Persky? (yes/no) and a list of alternative candidates (not including Persky). If a majority vote to recall, then the highest vote-getter of the alternative candidates gets the seat; if a majority don’t vote to recall, then the alternative votes don’t matter. You may recall that’s how Schwarzen..Shwarze… uh, Arnold, was elected governor the first time around — Gray Davis was recalled and Arnold was the top vote-getter of a long list of candidates.
I’m not sure how the timing works. Depending on when the recall petition gets filed with the requisite number of signatures, it could be that the recall election gets scheduled to take place during the regular November election. I also don’t know whether filing a recall petition now would only affect the remaining months on Persky’s term, i.e. do they need to wait until after his new term begins to do the recall?
Thanks, Screechy Monkey.
#2 You need to find a different name for your invention. The one you are using is already taken.
The Hastert Rule, also known as the “majority of the majority” rule, is an informal governing principle used by Republican Speakers of the House of Representatives since the mid-1990s to maintain their speakerships and limit the power of the minority party to bring bills up for a vote on the floor of the House.
Wait, whatnow? Fraternities are somethings that have to be ‘stood up to’? They have actual significant political power within universities? Isn’t that fucked all the way up?
Lisak’s survey of unindicted rapists was collected (in part) by avoiding the ‘r-word.’ As long as ‘rape’ wasn’t used, the subjects freely admitted to multiple felonies. And as Lisak carefully documented, their histories were every bit as violent and criminal as those of ‘bushy haired stranger’ rapists who had been convicted and imprisoned.
Since Judge Persky was himself a Stanford ‘student-athlete’ the suspicion of Hastert-ism is just too easy to jump to.
‘…the evidence points to a far more sinister reality, in which the vast majority of sexual assaults are committed by serial, violent predators.
‘This reality has potentially significant implications for how universities deal with sexual violence within their communities. Prevention efforts geared toward persuading men not to commit sexual assault are very unlikely to be effective. Lessons can be drawn from many decades of experience in sex offender treatment, which have demonstrated that it is extremely difficult to change the behavior of a serial predator even when you incarcerate him and subject him to an intensive, multi-year treatment program. Rather than focusing prevention efforts on the rapists, it would seem far more effective to focus those efforts on the far more numerous bystanders—men and women who are part of the social and cultural milieu in which rapes are spawned and who can be mobilized to identify perpetrators and intervene in high-risk situations.’
http://www.davidlisak.com/wp-content/uploads/pdf/SARUnderstandingPredatoryNatureSexualViolence.pdf
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