California colleges could seek restraining orders for campus threats

In California, a threat aimed at a college campus could get a faster legal response under SB 1374. The bill would let a postsecondary institution’s chief administrative officer, or a designated campus official, ask a court for a temporary restraining order or injunction on behalf of the school itself when it becomes aware of unlawful violence or a credible threat of violence directed at the institution.

That matters because current law is built around student-specific harm. It already lets the same kind of campus official seek that protection when a student has suffered unlawful violence or faced a credible threat tied to the school. SB 1374 would keep that student-centered path in place and add the institution as another possible petitioner.

When the campus is the target

The bill is aimed only at postsecondary educational institutions, not elementary or secondary schools. It would widen the kinds of conduct that can support an order, including phone calls or correspondence, such as email, sent to the institution, its employees, its students, or directly to the chief administrative officer.

It also reaches campus property owned by the institution. That is a small but important shift. A threat does not always arrive as a single encounter with one person. Sometimes it lands as repeated contact, messages or pressure that make the whole campus feel exposed.

A civil tool, not a new penalty

SB 1374 amends Section 527.85 of the Code of Civil Procedure. It does not create a new criminal offense. It gives colleges and universities another civil court option when the danger is broader than one student’s case and the institution itself is the object of the threat.

The bill was introduced by Senator Roger Niello, with Senator Rosilicie Ochoa Bogh as coauthor. For campus administrators and safety staff, the practical question is whether the school can act before a threat spreads through classrooms, offices and public spaces.