A lot of police these days seem to be simply be out to arrest and charge whoever they can, for whatever they can.<\/p>\n
Supreme Court Turns Away ‘Knock-And-Talk’ Case Backed by Gun Rights Groups<\/a><\/p>\n The Supreme Court denied cert to dozens of cases on Monday, and while we’ve talked about a few of those denials<\/a> already, there’s at least one more that’s worth discussing.<\/p>\n Reel v. North Carolina\u00a0<\/em>wasn’t really a Second Amendment case, but a number of 2A organizations signed on to an amicus brief urging the Court to hear the challenge brought by Quashan Reel against the state of North Carolina.<\/p>\n The underlying issue in Reel\u00a0<\/em>involves the \u201cimplied license\u201d that permits a \u201cvisitor to approach the home by the front path, knock promptly, wait briefly to be received, and then (absent invitation to linger longer) leave.\u201d As Reel’s cert petition explained:<\/p>\n Police rely on this \u201cimplied license\u201d to conduct untold thousands of so-called \u201cknock-and-talk\u201d investigations each year under the theory that entering the curtilage of the home to conduct a \u201cknock and talk\u201d does not implicate the Fourth Amendment.<\/p>\n But this Court in Jardines<\/em> also instructed that an officer\u2019s purpose in entering the curtilage of the home has constitutional relevance. If police \u201center the protected premises of the home in order to do nothing but conduct a search,\u201d they have conducted a search within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n The question Reel posed to SCOTUS was this: When police enter the curtilage of the home to conduct a \u201cknock-and-talk\u201d investigation with the purpose of gathering incriminating evidence against the homeowner, do police conduct a search within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment?<\/p>\n You can see why Second Amendment groups like Gun Owners of America, Gun Owners of California, and Tennessee Firearms Association took an interest<\/a> in this case. If police can use these “knock-and-talks” to conduct searches of homes, then gun owners<\/a>, particularly those who reside in places where there’s hostility towards our right to keep and bear arms, can easily be targeted and become the victims of warrantless searches.<\/strong><\/p>\n Reel’s case stemmed from a police investigation into his activities in 2020. Police in High Point, North Carolina suspected him of dealing narcotics, and parked a patrol car near his home. When a woman walked up to Reel’s front door officers followed, and when the door was closed after allowing her inside, the officers forced the door open and broke inside, where they discovered marijuana and pills.<\/p>\n The officers claimed they smelled marijuana when the door was opened, which gave them probable cause and exigent circumstances to search without a warrant. But if police were already conducting an investigation into Reel’s activities, then the alleged \u2018knock and talk\u2019 was nothing more than a pretext to search Reel’s home in violation of the Fourth Amendment.<\/p>\n Quoting again from the amicus brief:<\/p>\n The conduct of the police challenged here by Petitioner illustrates how the \u201cimplicit license\u201drecognized by this Court has been abused in practice.<\/p>\n Here, the officers did not \u201capproach the home by the front path,\u201d did not \u201cknock promptly,\u201d did not \u201cwait briefly to be received,\u201d or receive an \u201cinvitation to linger longer,\u201d and then, did not \u201cleave.\u201d Instead, they forced their way in immediately behind an invited guest, without ever \u201cknocking and talking\u201d at all.<\/p>\n When \u201cknock and talk\u201d is expanded to cover such behavior, and then combined with \u201cexigent circumstances,\u201d the Fourth Amendment\u2019s protections of the home are dramatically weakened.<\/p>\n The court below largely ignored every word this Court has written on principles of relevance here, and it is not alone. Many other federal and state courts have sanctioned all manner of police efforts to expand this rule, granting increasingly abusive intrusions into the home and its curtilage.<\/p>\n The front path rule, the duration limitation, the time of day, and other limitations that apply to other visitors have been stretched beyond any understanding of the original rule.<\/p>\n Accordingly, these amici agree with Fourth Amendment scholars that additional guidance is now required from this Court to prevent further abuses.<\/p>\n These amici urge this Court to grant certiorari to adopt a clear and enforceable rule, that \u201cthe right of a police officer to conduct a \u2018knock and talk\u2019 is no greater than a Girl Scout has to approach a house to sell cookies.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n The Girl Scout reference comes from the Supreme Court’s decision<\/a> in an earlier case where the Court held that if “Girl Scouts and trick-or-treaters\u201d have a \u201cknock and talk\u201d implied license, the police should also be granted such a license.<\/p>\n The Girl Scouts don’t have any right to barge into your home just because they can see an empty cookie jar on the kitchen counter when you open the door. Trick-or-treaters don’t have the right to go search your refrigerator just because you offer them candy on your porch. There are limits to that implied license, at least if you’re not wearing a badge.<\/p>\n We don’t know why the Court denied cert to Reel<\/em>, but this does seem to be an issue that the justices should address. The circumstances that led to Reel’s home being searched are far beyond the limits of the “implied license” SCOTUS has recognized, and these practices will continue in jurisdictions around the country until the Court makes it clear that they must stop. That won’t happen in this case, but I appreciate GOA, GOC, and TFA for taking an interest in this issue and urging the Court to step up and deal with these abuses.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A lot of police these days seem to be simply be out to arrest and charge whoever they can, for whatever they can. Supreme Court Turns Away ‘Knock-And-Talk’ Case Backed by Gun Rights Groups The Supreme Court denied cert to dozens of cases on Monday, and while we’ve talked about a few of those denials … Continue reading “”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23,24],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-119137","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-courts","category-rights"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119137","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=119137"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119137\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":119139,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119137\/revisions\/119139"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=119137"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=119137"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=119137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}