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 already, there’s at least one more that’s worth discussing. 

Reel v. North Carolina 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. 

The underlying issue in Reel involves the “implied license” that permits a “visitor to approach the home by the front path, knock promptly, wait briefly to be received, and then (absent invitation to linger longer) leave.” As Reel’s cert petition explained:

Police rely on this “implied license” to conduct untold thousands of so-called “knock-and-talk” investigations each year under the theory that entering the curtilage of the home to conduct a “knock and talk” does not implicate the Fourth Amendment. But this Court in Jardines also instructed that an officer’s purpose in entering the curtilage of the home has constitutional relevance. If police “enter the protected premises of the home in order to do nothing but conduct a search,” they have conducted a search within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment.

The question Reel posed to SCOTUS was this: When police enter the curtilage of the home to conduct a “knock-and-talk” investigation with the purpose of gathering incriminating evidence against the homeowner, do police conduct a search within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment?

You can see why Second Amendment groups like Gun Owners of America, Gun Owners of California, and Tennessee Firearms Association took an interest in this case. If police can use these “knock-and-talks” to conduct searches of homes, then gun owners, 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. 

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.

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 ‘knock and talk’ was nothing more than a pretext to search Reel’s home in violation of the Fourth Amendment.

Quoting again from the amicus brief:

The conduct of the police challenged here by Petitioner illustrates how the “implicit license”recognized by this Court has been abused in practice. Here, the officers did not “approach the home by the front path,” did not “knock promptly,” did not “wait briefly to be received,” or receive an “invitation to linger longer,” and then, did not “leave.” Instead, they forced their way in immediately behind an invited guest, without ever “knocking and talking” at all. When “knock and talk” is expanded to cover such behavior, and then combined with “exigent circumstances,” the Fourth Amendment’s protections of the home are dramatically weakened. 

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. 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. Accordingly, these amici agree with Fourth Amendment scholars that additional guidance is now required from this Court to prevent further abuses.These amici urge this Court to grant certiorari to adopt a clear and enforceable rule, that “the right of a police officer to conduct a ‘knock and talk’ is no greater than a Girl Scout has to approach a house to sell cookies.”

The Girl Scout reference comes from the Supreme Court’s decision in an earlier case where the Court held that if “Girl Scouts and trick-or-treaters” have a “knock and talk” implied license, the police should also be granted such a license.

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. 

We don’t know why the Court denied cert to Reel, 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. 

Editor’s Note: Second Amendment groups across the country are doing everything they can to protect the rights of gun owners. 

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