By Aaron Miller-
A U.S judge who gave a former Stanford University swimmer a light sentence of six months in jail instead of a long prison term for sexual assault has been sacked from his office.
Santa Clara County Judge Aaron Persky faces a future of shame after he was sacked after delivering the controversial verdict to Brock Turner in 2016. Voters in California’s primary election in Santa Clara County decided to axe Judge Aaron Persky who made national headlines when he granted convicted rapist Brock Turner a shockingly lenient sentence of six months behind bars. Voters united to eliminate Persky. Historically, this will be the first time a judge has been recalled in California in 87 years, since 1932.
Turner, a former Stanford University swimmer, was convicted on three felony counts for sexually assaulting a woman behind a dumpster at a fraternity party in 2015. Unscrupulous judge Persky argued for a six year sentence, Turner only ended up serving three months and had to register as a sex offender. Persky’s ruling was widely criticized as unjust, and soon after his ruling people were calling for his dismissal.
At the sentencing hearing, Persky attempted to defend his lame verdict by saying he considered the fact that Turner was drinking as a mitigating factor in his sentence. Against his injudiciousness, critics stated that Turner’s status as an elite, white young athlete at a prestigious university also factored into Persky’s decision to be lenient.
In a statement submitted to the Santa Clara County Registrar and that appeared on the ballot, Persky defended himself by saying, “As a prosecutor, I fought vigorously for victims. As a judge, my role is to consider both sides. California law requires every judge to consider rehabilitation and probation for first-time offenders. It’s not always popular, but it’s the law, and I took an oath to follow it without regard to public opinion or my opinions as a former prosecutor.”
WORTH
The Sentencing hearing was prompted after Stanford University Law School professor Michele Dauber chaired the campaign to recall Judge Persky. Dauber said of his recall :In a moving statement from the assault victim, she attacked the judge for undermining and taking away her worth and confidence. A statement from the victim who was rigorously cross-examined about her drinking habits and sexual experience read:’
‘You took away my worth, my privacy, my energy, my time, my intimacy, my confidence, my own voice, until today,” she said in a statement read in court before the sentencing.
A campaign for the judge to be recalled was launched by a Stamford Professor who knew the victim and was appalled at the ucrazily stupendous verdict. Santa Clara County voters firm decision on Tuesday to dethrone Judge Persky from office ends 15 years on the bench. Persky, whose accolades include the Californian Association of Human Relations Organisation Civil Rights Leadership Award on hate crime and the State Bar of California’s Wiley Brono Bono Award for the poor, has ruined his previously respectable credentials.
As a judge, he was tasked with the duty of applying the law proportionately to cases, but failed miserably to deliver on the professional abilities that has seen him make many decisions in the past. He is the former chair of the Court’s Community outreach Committee. In June 2016, Persky was elected without opposition for another six-year term on the bench. If the absence of opposition to his candidacy cowere to be used as a measure of the quality of the other potential contenders, a logical extrapolation would be that the rest are useless!Judge Aaron Percy’s demise provides clear evidence of the potential swathe of ineffective judges sitting on benches and delivering horrendous verdicts.
American judges with academic degrees and professional experience who are simply stupid orr fraudulent in their judgements should be fished out and thrown out in similar fashion.