Disturbed student threatening FIL--advice pls

[Guest guest]

Slightly off topic, but I knew if anybody had advice about dealing with

threatening mentally ill people, it'd be you guys.

Here's the brief story--my FIL (nice, normal guy) teaches at an university in

the midwest and is the head of his department. There was a troublesome student

in one of the communication classes who talked about disturbing things--a lot

about guns and death. He also kept trying to get the university's student run TV

crew to help him film--I guess a documentary?--about a concentration camp he was

planning in Iowa. WTF. He also ranted and raved to an university administrator

about FIL and it was threatening in nature--but this admin never told anybody.

We only know about it because DH was working in that department, and overheard

it. It was disturbing enough as is, and a lot of the teachers were scared, and

he eventually was kicked out of school for being too much of a threat. We

thought that was the end of that.

He was scary enough as is, but FIL has Jewish ancestry. He converted from

Judaism to Christianity in his 20s, but that doesn't hide the fact that he has a

very Jewish last name and appearance.

Sadly, we all found out today that he's back at the university--somehow snuck

back in. He legally changed his name, and enrolled through a " continuing

studies " vs. the regular degree-track way. Also, he had some sort of agreement

not to go anywhere near FIL's department. He totally flaunted that, and was

talking with FIL's department secretary, asking if FIL has been talking about

him. And the secretary didn't tell him or anybody about this. He was also

talking with the other department secretary (both part time), bragging about how

the ATF raided his home but didn't find anything, and is still acting very

strangely, and very focused on guns and such.

That's not all--the most disturbing thing, and I have to share this because it

is so weird--when he legally changed his name, he changed it to Doc Holliday. No

kidding. I tried searching around but couldn't find him (the student) online,

but there's just too many articles about the real-life gunslinger who went on a

revenge vendetta. Which ties into what we're afraid of, that he may be trying to

get some sort of revenge against FIL for being instrumental in getting him

kicked out of school for being a threat to students and other faculty. (Yeah, he

freaked out a lot of students in this one class that they refused to come to

class without a security guard.)

What's the most frustrating thing, and the part I need advice on for him, the

administration isn't taking it seriously. I guess they're " investigating " right

now, but whatever promise the guy made about not going near FIL's department

didn't work since he did that on a couple of occasions. But FIL is scared, and

we're all afraid it'll turn into a Loughner (sp?) situation. FIL's trying to

work from home a lot, and is going to try to get a security guard to stay in the

office with him (they can do that sometimes) for safety reasons. But while the

college head is trying to advocate for one of her department heads, FIL, the

administration isn't acting concerned.

So...if admin isn't going to take this student's threatening behavior seriously,

or FIL's safety seriously, what can FIL do? I don't know if a restraining order

would work, since there wasn't an actual direct " I'm going to kill you " threat.

Or if FIL should ask for police help in investigating, or what he could do.

Lawyer it up to force administration to take it seriously? I honestly don't

know. My MIL has been swearing up a storm apparently, and called to tell DH all

about it, and she is really scared for FIL.

So, if you guys have any advice on potential legal or security things FIL can

do, that would be amazing.

At the very least, prayers would be wonderful, too.

Holly