California grad student left threats of violence in campus bathrooms, sparking fear, prosecutors say

The San José State University Police Department and the FBI have nabbed a man they say is the culprit behind a series of violent and hateful written messages left in men’s and gender-neutral bathrooms at the university.

The scrawled threats warned of bombings and knife and gun violence and sparked fear on campus, authorities say.

The suspect was identified as Ziheng “Tony” Fang, 30, of San José, a graduate student pursuing a master’s degree in data science. Fang was arrested and charged with one federal count of false information and hoaxes, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. Although Fang was charged in a single incident, authorities allege the defendant was responsible for a string of hateful messages found across the Northern California campus.

Citing a criminal complaint, the Justice Department said police had identified 20 separate instances of Fang allegedly leaving these messages in bathrooms. The messages had been appearing sporadically since October 2024, with the last one seen on May 14 of this year, authorities said. In several instances, according to a Justice Department news release, the messages left in the bathrooms included “threats specifying a particular date that an attack was allegedly intended to take place.” Additionally, the threats included the weapons or methods of the planned attack, the agency said, citing court records.

A message in a plastic sheath, found on Nov. 5 of last year, had Fang’s fingerprint on it, prosecutors said, and another message was found in that same bathroom scrawled on the wall, calling for the death of multiple ethnic groups and warning of mass bombings.

The message on the paper found on Nov. 5 said, in messy handwriting: “!WARNING! MASS BOMB NEXT WEEK,” and included several swastika symbols, images of the poster show.

According to the Justice Department, the criminal complaint stated that investigators looked at the times that Fang used a key card to access school buildings and said that, in 16 instances, threatening messages were found in bathrooms in the days that followed.

In other instances, Fang was seen on surveillance footage entering and exiting the bathrooms or areas near the bathrooms, up to a day before the messages were found, prosecutors said.

Because of these threats to school property and the safety of students, the office of the San José State president sent out several email and text message alerts to students and staff “before dates that attacks were allegedly set to take place,” the complaint states, according to the Justice Department. When these messages were issued, professors at the campus independently “decided whether or not to cancel class or hold it virtually.”

The alerts caused widespread alarm. On the days of the alleged threats, the campus buildings mentioned were like a “ghost town,” prosecutors said.

Fang is in federal custody after being arrested Friday and is set to have a detention hearing Thursday, where a judge will decide whether he will be released while his case is pending.

Times staff writer Clara Harter contributed to this report.