Legislation seeking to criminalize some of the key methods used by animal rights protesters to target researchers was passed by the California State Senate last Friday (Aug 22).

The Senate unanimously passed the bill, which now makes its way to the State Assembly, where it must be approved before it goes to the governor's desk, according to the Los Angeles Times.

The bill, which cleared the Senate Public Safety committee earlier this month, would make it a misdemeanor to enter researchers' homes or publish the personal information of researchers or their immediate families to encourage violent crime against them.

The State Assembly approved a previous version of the bill before it was revised to address First Amendment issues raised by free speech proponents. Recent attention has been focused on animal rights protesters targeting researchers in California due to recent attacks on animal researchers at UC Santa Cruz and elsewhere.

Earlier this month, the names, photos, and personal information of several UCSC researchers were printed in flyers left at a Santa Cruz coffee shop a few days before the home and car of two university scientists - one of whom was listed in the pamphlets - were firebombed.