Aaron Persky
American judge
Michael Aaron Persky (born March 7, 1962) is an American attorney and former judge of the Santa Clara County Superior Court from 2003 to 2018.
In 2016, Persky gained national attention after his ruling in the case People v. Turner, in which he sentenced Stanford University student Brock Turner to six months in jail for the sexual assault and attempted rape of an unconscious 22-year-old woman, Chanel Miller, using the sentence recommended by the Santa Clara County Probation Department. The sentence led to public outrage and was criticized by prosecutors and victims' rights advocates as being influenced by race, gender, and class bias. However, the California Commission on Judicial Performance found that there was not clear and convincing evidence of wrongdoing in their investigation of the case. Nonetheless, in the June 2018 primary elections, voters overwhelmingly recalled Persky, with 61.51% in favor, making Persky the first judge in California to be recalled since 1932.
Prior to joining the bench, he practiced civil litigation for five years and was a prosecutor in Santa Clara County for six years. He also briefly coached girls' tennis at Lynbrook High School in the fall of 2019.
Early life and education
Michael Aaron Persky was born in 1962. His father, Murray Persky, was a psychiatrist.
The public source identifies “Aaron Persky” as american judge. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Aaron, Persky and American.
Why this record matters
A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Aaron Persky”, the useful work is to connect “american judge” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.
Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Dec 8, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q24506009. VIAF identifies the subject as 60150746937316300029. The Library of Congress control number is no2017127289. None of the 3 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1962, 2003, 2018 and 2016.
The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.
- Subject orientation
- Search vocabulary
- Locating named sources
The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Aaron Persky”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Aaron Persky primary sources, Aaron Persky archive and Aaron research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Aaron Persky”?
- What terminology or title could unlock a more precise catalogue search?
- Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Aaron Persky” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.