4th Amendment protection against unreasonable search and seizure (specifically warrantless entry into a home without probable cause) took a hit from SCOTUS last month
The new non-criminal"objective reasonableness" under the "totality of the circumstances"in "emergency aid" settings islower than the "probable cause"standard - even in previous "exigent circumstances" cases – in suspected criminal settings.
FACTS of the case (abbreviated) -
A Montana man's ex-girlfriend called police for a welfare check on him. Concerned about possibly suicide-by-cop intentions, or attempt already effectuated, and seeing empty beer cans and an empty hoslter through a window, the police suited up in armor, carried long guns, and made entry.
When they entered an upstairs bedroom, the resident emerged from a closet holding an item one officer took for a gun, and the officer fired on the petitioner. Police recovered a gun from next to where the petitioner was standing. The petitioner survived and was charged locally with assaulting a police officer !!!
Opinion Summary from Congress.gov -
… [After an overview of the 4th Amendment protections, the authors of this brief for Congress discussed the new SCOTUS ruling:]
"The petitioner appealed to the Supreme Court of the United States, and the Justices unanimously affirmed his conviction. In an opinion authored by Justice Kagan, the Court reviewed the trio of previous cases on the emergency exception discussed above: Brigham City, Fisher, and Caniglia. The Court concluded that the Montana Supreme Court's reliance on the "community caretaking doctrine" was "ill-advised, … cannot alone justify a warrantless home entry."''' …
"The petitioner had argued that the "objectively reasonable basis" test from Brigham City should be read as "sounding in probable cause," requiring that officers have probable cause to believe a requisite emergency exists. The Court rejected the argument that the "probable cause" standard should apply as a "spin" on the Brigham City test, saying that the probable cause standard is "peculiarly related to criminal investigations" and that law surrounding the standard "would fit awkwardly, if at all, the non-criminal, non-investigatory setting at issue here."''' …
"In evaluating the particulars of the petitioner's situation, the Court explained that objective reasonableness must be determined in light of the "totality of the circumstances." The petitioner argued that the officers were objectively unreasonable in their evaluation of the situation because only by entering the home did they trigger the possibility of "suicide-by-cop." The Court found that the possibility "that Case could provoke a confrontation" was just one of several circumstances to consider—the officers also had their own observations and information from his ex-girlfriend suggesting that the petitioner might "already have shot himself or would do so absent intervention." The Court concluded that the officers' decision "to enter his home to prevent that result—even at some significant risk to themselves—was (at the least) reasonable.The Fourth Amendment did not require them, as Case now argues, to leave him to his fate."
https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/LSB11394 (background, context, forward looking action Congress can take).
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ok3lY9nNa6Q&pp=ugUHEgVlbi1VUw%3D%3D ''(video - "The NEW Ruling Cops Use to Search Your Home WITHOUT a Warrant"
489K views · 10 days ago. Hampton Law)''
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"Following the decision, Matthew Cavedon, Director of Cato’s Project on Criminal Justice, said the following:
'''“Every man’s home is his castle under the Fourth Amendment. The Court declined to [apply] the familiar probable cause standard …Justice Gorsuch’s concurring opinion reiterated that emergency aid entries are not an excuse to search for evidence of criminal activity.Hopefully, today’s decision will not be read more broadly than the Court intended.”
https://www.cato.org/news-releases/cato-expert-available-supreme-court-rules-warrantless-home-entries-case-v-montana#
GOOD OVERVIEW
Including: "…Kagan cautioned that the“emergency aid” exception to the warrant requirement does not give police officers free rein “to search the premises beyond what is reasonably needed to deal with the emergency while maintaining the officers’ safety.”
https://www.scotusblog.com/2026/01/court-finds-police-properly-entered-mans-home-despite-absence-of-a-warrant/