This is not a good precedent. I, of course, view it from my perspective – 36 years on the bench. I found early on that I had to make a decision – be swayed by public reaction or not. I chose not to let it affect my decisions, deciding that I would rather lose an election than sell out to public opinion. But I watched others do otherwise, increasing the severity of sentences during a contested election year. Judge Persky’s recall just increases the likelihood of this type of thing.