The woman leading the campaign to disrobe a judge who sentenced a Stanford swimmer to just six months in jail for sexual assault has received two harrowing threats of rape — including one encased in a so-called “glitter bomb” — in the span of two weeks.
Michele Dauber, a Stanford law professor and the chairwoman of the Recall Judge Aaron Persky campaign, received the threatening note earlier this month in an envelope from ShipYourEnemiesGlitter.com. A week later, on Valentine’s Day, she received another threat with identical text, but this time accompanied by an unknown white powder rather than millions of tiny bits of plastic.
“Since you are going to disrobe [Judge Aaron] Persky, I am going to treat you like ‘Emily Doe,’” the note read, Dauber told the Washington Post. “Let’s see what kind of sentencing I get for being a rich white male.”
The “rich white male” referenced in the threats is an apparent allusion to Brock Turner, the former Stanford University swimmer who served only three months in jail after a jury convicted him of sexually assaulting a young woman behind a dumpster during an on-campus frat party in 2015. Turner, who received three years’ probation, also had to register as a sex offender.
“It was one of those things when time slowed down a little bit,” Dauber said of receiving the second note.
Stanford officials later said in a statement that the white substance inside the envelope was harmless, but Dauber told the Washington Post that the case has since been referred to the FBI, although bureau officials in San Francisco declined to confirm or deny an investigation to the newspaper.
“It’s been upsetting and scary, but I think it’s very important that the campaign goes forward,” Dauber said. “We’re not going to be intimidated. We’re going to keep advocating for survivors of sexual assault and of violence against women. I think it’s very important to send a message that we’re not deterred.”
Dauber said tensions between those who support and oppose Persky’s removal as a California Superior Court judge have apparently been stoked since the campaign to remove him gathered enough signatures in January to place the recall election on the June ballot.
“It’s clear we need judges who understand sexual assault and violence against women and take it seriously,” the campaign’s website reads. “It’s up to us, the voters, to make a difference.”
But those who support Persky — including Santa Ana District Attorney Jeff Rosen, whose office prosecuted Turner’s case — say removing him from the bench based on one decision is particularly problematic.
“Judicial recalls over a single judicial ruling threaten our independent judiciary and set a dangerous precedent,” retired California judge LaDoris Cordell said in a statement posted on Voices Against Recall, a website for a campaign supporting Persky. “Recalls should be reserved for judges who have a pattern of bias or misconduct. Judge Persky has neither.”
Rosen, meanwhile, has said he “strongly disagrees” with the sentence Persky handed down to Turner, but said he should not be removed from the courtroom.
“I am so pleased that the victim’s powerful and true statements about the devastation of campus sexual assault are being heard across our nation,” Rosen said in a statement in 2016. “She had given voice to thousands of sexual assault survivors.”
But Dauber insists that as elected officials, California judges should always be held accountable and if necessary, face a recall, a “constitutional right of voters,” she said.
“It’s a feature, not a bug, of our system,” she told the Washington Post. “Our campaign is extremely carefully messaged and aimed at high-status white college athletes who have committed violence against women, and I don’t think judges will be so illogical that, because of our campaign, they need to increase sentences for poor minority drug offenders. I think that’s nonsense, and I think there’s nothing to support that.”