SCOTUS reverses CA9 denial of qualified immunity on exigent circumstances entry; and exigency gets another lift

Ryburn v. Huff, 2012 U.S. LEXIS 1063 (U.S. January 23, 2012) (per curiam), reversing in part Huff v. City of Burbank, 632 F. 3d 539 (9th Cir. January 11, 2011):

Judge Rawlinson dissented. She explained that “the discrete incident that precipitated the entry in this case was Mrs. Huff’s response to the question regarding whether there were guns in the house.” Id., at 31. She faulted the majority for “recit[ing] a sanitized account of this event” that differed markedly from the District Court’s findings of fact, which the majority had conceded must be credited. Judge Rawlinson looked to “cases that specifically address the scenario where officer safety concerns prompted the entry” and concluded that, under the rationale articulated in those cases, “a police officer could have reasonably believed that he was justified in making a warrantless entry to ensure that no one inside the house had a gun after Mrs. Huff ran into the house without answering the question of whether anyone had a weapon.” Id., at 31, 33, 37.

Judge Rawlinson’s analysis of the qualified immunity issue was correct. No decision of this Court has found a Fourth Amendment violation on facts even roughly comparable to those present in this case. On the contrary, some of our opinions may be read as pointing in the opposition direction.

In Brigham City v. Stuart, 547 U. S. 398, 400 (2006), we held that officers may enter a residence without a warrant when they have “an objectively reasonable basis for believing that an occupant is … imminently threatened with [serious injury].” We explained that “‘[t]he need to protect or preserve life or avoid serious injury is justification for what would be otherwise illegal absent an exigency or emergency.’” Id., at 403 (quoting Mincey v. Arizona, 437 U. S. 385, 392 (1978)). In addition, in Georgia v. Randolph, 547 U. S. 103, 118 (2006), the Court stated that “it would be silly to suggest that the police would commit a tort by entering [a residence] … to determine whether violence … is about to (or soon will) occur.”

A reasonable police officer could read these decisions to mean that the Fourth Amendment permits an officer to enter a residence if the officer has a reasonable basis for concluding that there is an imminent threat of violence. In this case, the District Court concluded that petitioners had such an objectively reasonable basis for reaching such a conclusion.

The Ninth Circuit’s panel was a little too ivory tower for SCOTUS. A hang-up when the police called inside did not have to be blown off as the people inside just exercising their right not to talk to the police because it could have meant more:

The panel majority—far removed from the scene and with the opportunity to dissect the elements of the situation—confidently concluded that the officers really had no reason to fear for their safety or that of anyone else. As the panel majority saw things, it was irrelevant that the Huffs did not respond when the officers knocked on the door and announced their presence and when they called the home phone because the Huffs had no legal obligation to respond to a knock on the door or to answer the phone. The majority attributed no significance to the fact that, when the officers finally reached Mrs. Huff on her cell phone, she abruptly hung up in the middle of their conversation. And, according to the majority, the officers should not have been concerned by Mrs. Huff’s reaction when they asked her if there were any guns in the house because Mrs. Huff “merely asserted her right to end her conversation with the officers and returned to her home.”

See School Law Blog.

But see Kentucky v. King, 131 S.Ct. 1849 (2011): “Others may appreciate the opportunity to make an informed decision about whether to answer the door to the police.”

Exigent circumstances in SCOTUS gets another lift, almost to the point that purported exigency is looking to outweigh search warrants. The court is nibbling around the “sanctity of the home” everywhere it can. See Silverman v. United States, 365 U.S. 505, 511 (1961) (“At [the Fourth Amendment’s] very core stands the right of a man to retreat to his own home and there be free from unreasonable governmental intrusion.” Silverman was cited with approval the same day as Ryburn in United States v. Jones, 10–1259 (U.S. January 23, 2012).