Diablo Valley College to reopen following graffiti threat

Laura Anthony Image
ByLaura Anthony KGO logo
Thursday, March 22, 2018
Diablo Valley College to reopen following graffiti threat
With some 20, 000 students, the campus at Diablo Valley College is normally bustling with activity, but not Thursday.

PLEASANT HILL, Calif. (KGO) -- With some 20, 000 students, the campus at Diablo Valley College is normally bustling with activity, but not Thursday. Classes were canceled and all buildings on the Pleasant Hill campus were locked up tight, due to threatening graffiti found in two campus bathrooms.

"That there was potential shooting that would be taking place on this campus," explained Tim Leong, a DVC spokesman. "So we took seriously and decided to close this particular campus."

RELATED: Diablo Valley College in Pleasant Hill closed due to threat

"If it did happen and kids were in class, people could've died," said DVC student Jordan Thompson. "But if it didn't happen, then better to be safe than sorry."

"I saw something, I said something, I yelled, I reported, I filed paperwork and nothing happened," said another student Hailey Brophy. She said she's been sounding the alarm about a possible threat to campus safety for a long time. Brophy claims another student, a male with a prior arrest for bringing a knife to a protest, has been making threatening statements to her and others for months.

"He made direct threats against the multicultural center on campus," said Brophy. "He participated in hate speech. He made anti-semitic comments, misogynistic comments and was just a really threatening figure."

RELATED: Occidental schools on voluntary lockdown after threatening graffiti found

With little response from campus administrators, Brophy's mother Jessica Pratt finally put a lengthy post--a warning to others--on Facebook.

On Monday, DVC's president sent an email to students, saying social media was full of "misinformation" and insisting the campus was safe.

Today, three days later, the main campus is closed due to the threatening graffiti.

Leong told us there is no evidence at this point to indicate the threats reported by Brophy and this week's graffiti are related and that both incidents are still being investigated

DVC says classes will resume Friday, and further updates will be on their website, www.dvc.edu.

Click here for more recent stories on school threats in the Bay Area and across the country.