SAN FRANCISCO — Critics of Aaron Persky, the Santa Clara Superior Court judge who found himself at the center of a nationwide furor last year over campus rape, on Monday formally initiated the long process of trying to unseat him.

Led by Stanford University law professor Michele Dauber, a total of 50 people including local politicians, progressive activists and Silicon Valley engineers Monday morning submitted a notice of intent to circulate a recall petition to the Santa Clara County Registrar of Voters.

Also among the signatories was Mark Lemley, a Stanford Law School professor and intellectual property litigator at Durie Tangri, San Jose Vice Mayor Magdalena Carrasco and Elisa Camahort Page, co-founder of media company BlogHer.