On February 16, 1988, a mass shooting occurred at the headquarters of ESL Incorporated in Sunnyvale, California, United States.

Farley was convicted of seven counts of first degree murder and is currently serving a death sentence at California Health Care Facility.

After his discharge in 1977, Farley began working as a software technician at ESL Inc., a defense contractor in Sunnyvale, California.

Farley began leaving gifts, including letters and homemade baked goods, on Laura Black's desk and asked her out numerous times.

[4] Despite her refusals, Farley persisted; he began calling her desk every few hours as well as showing up at Black's aerobics class.

Farley was also known to have befriended the custodial department in an attempt to copy keys to Black's desk so he could rifle through her files to gain an insight into her life.

[8] Black filed for a temporary restraining order against Farley on February 2, 1988, and it was granted by a family court judge.

He also owned a variety of other weapons which were not present during the shooting at ESL, including a Mossberg shotgun barrel and a Ruger .22 LR carbine and over 3,000 rounds of ammunition.

[citation needed] On the day before the court date, February 16, 1988, Farley drove his motorhome to the ESL parking lot in Sunnyvale, California.

At about 2:50 P.M., Farley loaded up his guns, describing his weaponry in his court testimony as a ".380 in front, the ammo pouch in front, .357 magnum to my right side, the .22 magnum behind it, a large buck knife behind that, numerous clips around the other side, and my vest, my nine millimeter, my two shotguns, and I tied a cord around the .22-250 and just draped it over me.”[1] When police searched the building after the shooting they found a Benelli Riot semi-automatic shotgun, a rifle with a scope, a pump-action shotgun, a Sentinel revolver, a Smith & Wesson .357 magnum revolver, a Browning semiautomatic pistol, a Smith & Wesson pistol, a smoke bomb, a leather glove, a belt with pouches filled with ammunition, other bags containing more than 200 rounds of ammunition, and a vest containing more than 800 rounds of ammunition, wooden matches, a foot-long buck knife and sheath, and ear protectors.

[1] Carrying over 1,000 rounds of ammunition with him, he approached ESL's M-5 Building, intending to make his way to Black’s second floor office.

During this exchange, fellow employee Christine Hansen left her hiding spot and also asked to leave, which Farley allowed.

Negotiators also obtained audio recording of the conversations, where Farley stated: "There's no more reason to harm anybody; I've run out of enthusiasm for things."

[11] The next day, court commissioner Lois Kittle made the restraining order against Farley permanent and commented, "Pieces of paper do not stop bullets.

His attorney claimed that Farley was never a violent man and only had his judgement temporarily clouded by his obsession with Black, and that he would likely never kill again.

[2][13] On August 9, 2024, district attorney Jeff Rosen sought to reduce Farley's sentence to life without parole.

[14] On December 6, 2024 a Santa Clara County Judge delayed the Ruling in the Resentencing case to March 2025 to allow more victims to speak out.

[15] This massacre helped prompt California's 1990 passage of the first anti-stalking laws in the U.S. A movie, I Can Make You Love Me[16] (also known as Stalking Laura in the United Kingdom) was made in 1993.

The shooting is also the subject of a chapter of the book The Gift of Fear: Survival Signals That Protect Us From Violence by Gavin de Becker.