Right to Fourth Amendment Privacy, Warrantless Entries, and Probable Cause
- WULR Team
- Mar 15
- 5 min read
An analysis of Case v. Montana and its 4th Amednment implications
Published March 15th, 2026
Written by Emma Hoffman
In September of 2021, William Case’s girlfriend called 911 to report Case’s concerning behavior. Case, an Army veteran, had been threatening to commit suicide, as well as to harm any officers who entered his home. The officers who arrived at the scene knew Case, his history of mental health issues and his prior threats of committing suicide via provocation of law enforcement. The police officers waited outside Case’s house for 40 minutes and, upon noticing an empty holster and a pad of paper (thought to contain a suicide note) inside the house, decided to enter the home without attempting to obtain a warrant. The officers encountered Case holding a dark object thought (and later confirmed) to be a weapon and shot Case in the arm and abdomen. Case was subsequently arrested for felony assault on a police officer. A pretrial motion was filed to suppress evidence obtained in a warrantless entry, which was denied. Upon conviction of aforementioned charges, Case appealed to the State and Federal Supreme Courts.
The question, penned by Oyez.org, became whether or not the police officers had the right to enter Case’s domicile “without a search warrant based on less than probable cause that an emergency [was] occurring?” According to the Legal Information Institute, probable cause “exists when the facts and circumstances within an officer’s knowledge would lead a reasonable person to believe that a crime has been committed.” Probable cause is commonly applicable in the case of criminal activity. However, Case’s appeal questions if probable cause was needed for the police officers to enter the petitioner’s home in a non-criminal context or if “reasonable suspicion,” requiring a lower degree of certainty, is sufficient. It is important to note that, according to Montana Code Annotated 45-5-105, suicide is not a crime in Montana.
The Montana Supreme Court originally determined that probable cause is “superfluous” when police are acting as a caretaker in a non-criminal setting. Case emphasizes that the police officers did not have probable cause when entering his home which, without a warrant, is the minimum requirement for entry. The defendant argues that in exigent circumstances reasonable suspicion is instead the minimum standard for entry into a person of interest’s home. The petitioner and defendant delivered contrasting accounts of what occurred in September 2021, as well as precedent on standards of evidence and the role police serve in non-criminal emergency situations.
While the state argues that the police officers had reasonable suspicion upon entering Case’s home, Case argues that this was not so. Rather, he maintains the police officers did not have probable cause and therefore the evidence they found and used to convict him of assault should be suppressed. Further divergence exists between the opinions of the petitioner and respondent. Case argues that the police officers were not exempt from obtaining probable cause because the role of “community caretaker” does not extend into a citizen’s home, as unanimously opined by the Supreme Court in Caniglia v. Strom. Regardless, the respondent argues that, because of precedent set in Brigham City v. Stuart by the Supreme Court, police with an “objectively reasonable basis to believe that an occupant is ‘seriously injured or threatened with such injury,” are able to enter homes without a warrant, returning to the argument that neither a warrant nor explicit probable cause was necessary. Chief Justice John Roberts writes in the final decision that “the need to protect or preserve life or avoid serious injury is justification for what would be otherwise illegal absent an exigency or emergency.”
The opposing arguments present a complex legal conundrum. Did the police officers have reasonable suspicion when entering Case’s home? Did this suspicion meet the standard for justification of entry? What role did police officers play when entering the home of an individual threatening both suicide and physical harm to police officers? Did these actions violate Case’s Fourth Amendment rights?
The National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers argued in its amicus brief that maintaining the right to privacy in one’s home is of the utmost importance. They posit that ensuring probable cause is obtained will not disrupt the activity of emergency responders, one of the potential drawbacks of tightening the restrictions on police’s ability to enter homes in exigent situations. The NACDL argues that probable cause and warrants are easy enough to obtain that enforcing such requirements will not delay response time of police officers. As an example, the NACDL uses a drug overdose case in which a call from a “reliable source” claiming that an individual is likely overdosing is sufficient to meet the threshold for probable cause.
If this is the case, however, the question arises whether the call made from Case’s partner and the absence of a gun from its holster inside Case’s home also meets the threshold for probable cause or reasonable suspicion.
Consistent with Brigham City v. Stuart, it appears that the police officers did have sufficient evidence (including their personal knowledge of Case and his history of mental health issues) to enter the petitioner’s home in attempts to curb dangerous, erratic behavior. Caniglia v. Strom does not permit police officers to act as “community caretakers” within the premises of an individual's home. However, the original case decision dealt with a seizure of property (guns) from an individual who had displayed dangerous behavior but was no longer in an emergency situation, as the individual had been moved to a hospital for a psychiatric evaluation. Case appeared to still be in the throes of a mental health crisis when police entered his home. Had the police not confronted Case, he may have hurt himself and/or others. Because of the severity of the situation and the observation of the scene by police officers as consistent with heightened likelihood of a suicide, it may be concluded that the officers had reasonable suspicion and a circumstantial right to enter Case’s home.
Still, the outcome of this ongoing case has implications for privacy and emergency response procedures. A ruling in favor of Case could set a precedent for greater right to privacy in one’s home, raising the bar for evidence required by police officers to enter a home for criminal and non-criminal investigations. Despite the claims by the NACDL about the accessibility of this threshold, it may make emergency responders more hesitant to enter homes of persons of interest, even when time is of the essence, such as in cases of individuals threatening suicide. A ruling against Case may provide police and emergency responders greater liberty in entering and investigating private spaces. Some in favor of Case’s position, such as the NACDL, argue that this will lead to miscarriages of justice and gross violations of the Fourth Amendment.
Optimal emergency response may be opposed to privacy rights enshrined in the Fourth Amendment. The concurrent issue of handling mental health emergencies is also present, as individuals suffering from such episodes deserve care and Constitutional protection. As Case stated, “law-abiding citizens should not lose Fourth Amendment protections just because they struggle with suicide and depression.”
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