Recall Judge Persky – Yea or Nay?

Last Sunday, while visiting the California Avenue Farmer’s Market, I met a well mannered man who asked me to sign a petition calling for a ballet initiative to remove Judge Aaron Persky from the bench.  The nice man was upset-more like outraged-that Brock Turner, a.k.a. the “Stanford Rapist,” was sentenced to just six month in county and out after 90 days with good behavior.   I asked the man what sentence he’d consider appropriate.  He replied without hesitation ten years, an even decade.  In doing so he was splitting the difference.  The legal maximum for the crimes of which Turner was convicted was 14 years and the DA had requested six years. 

This seemed reasonable.  The man was asking for four years below the maximum allowable by law and four years above the district attorney’s request.  Nevertheless the fly in the ointment is that, on average, it takes $71,000 per year to incarcerate an inmate in California.  The ten years the man was asking for would cost California taxpayers (and I’m one of them) close to three quarters of a million dollars.  Crikey!!!  What sort of return could I expect from such a substantial investment?

I asked how ten years of imprisonment would contribute to Brock Turner’s rehabilitation adding that I don’t care to spend hard earned money to transform an antisocial young man into an even more antisocial middle aged man.  The guy with the petition was very honest.  He explained that he had no interest what so ever in Brock Turner’s rehabilitation.  What he was after was retribution plain and simple. 

Some people, such as Jeffrey Dahmer, need to be locked up for life for our protection as well as their own.  Other such as Manson family member Leslie Van Houten, who was recently granted parole, have committed such atrocities that they have forever forfeited the right to be understood.  Van Houten should never go free.  We can all agree on that.  But what’s the point in reintroducing a person such as Turner into society if he isn’t allowed the opportunity to redeem himself and how does a ten year sentence improve the situation?   

One last thing I’d like to say about this case.  I was present at Turner’s trial and the spectator area of Judge Persky’s courtroom was, for the most part, empty.  At no point was anyone turned away for lack of seating.  Strange that a trail that’s attracted international attention wasn’t better attended.