Shoal Creek Elementary School Principal Harmeena Omoto has been honored with the San Diego County District Attorney’s Office Citizens of Courage Award for her acts of bravery amid threats of a mass shooting at her school.
Summer Stephan, the county’s district attorney, said Omoto responded to a difficult circumstance at the Poway Unified School District campus when students were threatened with harm. Omoto stood up to a bully in court, attended multiple hearings and made sure there was accountability, she said.
“Principal Omoto is deserving of this award because of the way she stepped up in an extremely difficult and frightening situation,” Stephan said. “She was there to protect her school and make her students feel comfortable.”
Lee Lor, 40, was found guilty in November 2025 of a single felony count of making criminal threats against Shoal Creek Elementary, which police responded to in December 2023. He was accused of sending more than 350 emails over six months stating he would commit a shooting at the Carmel Mountain Ranch school, according to news reports.
Lor lived less than a mile away from the campus at the time of the threats.
“It was definitely difficult when I think about the students and staff who I’m responsible for,” Omoto said after receiving her award on April 24. “This was the right thing to do to hold this person accountable for the fear he instilled in the students and staff.
“I did it with a lot of support from the school district, supervisors, friends and family,” she added. “I had a lot of support to make sure he was held accountable for his actions.”
The school’s principal for the past five years said she became aware of the threats — which prosecutors said were made when Lor replied to random spam emails in his inbox — when the San Diego Police Department alerted her.
“It was shared that the individual had sent many communications about this to many different individuals or platforms,” Omoto said.
McKenzie Patterson / For The San Diego Union-Tribune
Harmeena Omoto speaks at the Citizens of Courage Awards. Omoto, a principal, is being honored at the Citizens of Courage Awards for her leadership during a serious threat at her school on April 24, 2026, at the Liberty Station Conference Center. (McKenzie Patterson / For The San Diego Union-Tribune)
Stephan said the selection process for awardees is difficult because her office encounters thousands of victims each year. Other recent awardees included a woman who confronted a church leader she had accused of sexual assault; a good Samaritan who gave aid and resisted an attacker; and an elderly woman who alleged she was targeted by a contractor and took the person to court to recover her money, Stephan said.
Stephan said Omoto deserves the award not only for protecting students and attending court hearings, but because she was also instrumental in changing laws and closing loopholes against threats.
Courtesy San Diego County District Attorney’s Office
The office of San Diego County District Attorney Summer Stephan investigated threats against Shoal Creek Elementary in Carmel Mountain Ranch. (Courtesy San Diego County District Attorney’s Office)
At the time of the Shoal Creek incident, California law required criminal threats to be directed at a specific individual instead of an entity such as a school. To proceed with the prosecution, the District Attorney named Omoto as the primary target.
But Stephan said threats against schools, houses of worship and hospitals are not threats against inanimate objects but are threats against people. She said she worked with state Assemblymember Darshana Patel, a former Poway Unified School District board member, to change the law so a specific victim does not need to be named “when clearly the intention is to threaten and scare human beings.”
Patel recognized the dangerous gap in the law that this case exposed and co-sponsored Senate Bill 19, according to Poway Unified officials.
SB 19, signed into law last October, now allows for the prosecution of threats made against entities, not just individuals, including schools, hospitals and houses of worship.
Omoto said the case involving Shoal Creek was instrumental in changing the legislation.
“Individuals who make threats against businesses, houses of worship and schools will be held accountable,” Omoto said. “I feel our school community can be proud that the legislation was changed so it makes it safer and individuals can be held accountable if they make threats against people who come to school or to work in these buildings every day.”
Omoto said the school had security systems in place, but after the threat, they made adjustments and increased the height of fencing around the campus. She said the school also increased communication to make the school community aware that everyone is responsible for the safety of schools.
“Safety is always in the forefront of everything we do each day by following best practices,” she said, adding that it took courage for the school community to come to campus to study and work throughout the process. “I feel proud that we were able to make a positive change happen and to hold an individual accountable for his actions. We were able to make it through together.”