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Quick Hits
- A California law taking effect on January 1, 2025, will allow employers to obtain temporary restraining orders for harassment against employees, broadening the existing law that only covered workplace violence or credible threats.
- The new law defines harassment as conduct that seriously alarms or annoys a specific person such that it causes substantial emotional distress.
California Senate Bill (SB) No. 428, which Governor Gavin Newsom signed into law on September 30, 2023, expands California Code of Civil Procedure Section 527.8 to allow businesses to seek a temporary restraining order against individuals for “harassment” of their employees.
The law will provide employers with a tool to protect employees from individuals who subject them to unreasonable conduct that causes them substantial emotional distress before the situation escalates into violence.
Understanding SB 428
California Code of Civil Procedure Section 527.8 currently allows employers to seek temporary restraining orders to protect employees from individuals who have engaged in violence or have made credible threats of violence. The law enables employers to file a petition for a temporary restraining order and order after hearing to protect employees and their immediate family members.
However, this remedy to safeguard employees is limited in that it only covers violence or threats of violence, and courts have been less inclined to grant restraining orders when the behavior does not involve violence or threats of violence.
SB 428 will expand the law to allow employers to seek restraining orders in situations where harassment may not rise to the level of a threat of violence. According to the legislative history, the current law would leave employers helpless in such situations where an older man is obsessed with a younger employee and repeatedly visits the workplace and/or calls up to one hundred times a day for a month. Supporters of SB 428 have argued that employers should not have to wait until such conduct escalates into threats of violence or worse.
Specifically, SB 428 will add “harassment” as a reason for seeking a restraining order. The law defines “harassment” as “a knowing and willful course of conduct directed at a specific person that seriously alarms, annoys, or harasses the person, and that serves no legitimate purpose. The course of conduct must be that which would cause a reasonable person to suffer substantial emotional distress, and must actually cause substantial emotional distress.”
However, the law does not permit courts to issue restraining orders for actions “that are constitutionally protected, protected by the National Labor Relations Act [(NLRA)], … or otherwise protected” under the law.
Next Steps
As the effective date of January 1, 2025, approaches, employers may want to start preparing for the expanded protections under SB 428. Preparations may include updating workplace policies, training human resources (HR) personnel and employees, and ensuring that all employees are aware of the new protections against harassment.
In the event of a complaint of harassment, employers may wish to explore whether a workplace violence restraining order is an appropriate remedy to address the complaint.
The law is one of several new California laws impacting employers set to take effect on January 1, 2025.
For more information on workplace violence temporary restraining orders, please listen to our podcast, “California Workplace Violence Restraining Orders: New Protections Take Effect in January 2025,” in which San Diego shareholder Amy Bianchini, joined Karen Tynan, co-chair of the firm’s Workplace Violence Prevention Practice Group, to discuss the circumstances under which a California employer may seek a restraining order on behalf of an employee.
Ogletree Deakins’ Workplace Violence Prevention Practice Group will continue to monitor developments and will provide updates on the California, Workplace Safety and Health, and Workplace Violence Prevention blogs.
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