The Supreme Court heard oral arguments on October 15, 2025, in a case that could fundamentally alter how police interact with gun owners during welfare checks. In Case v. Montana, the Department of Justice is defending warrantless home entries by law enforcement, including federal agents, and the authority to prosecute cases where evidence of crimes is discovered during those entries.
The case has galvanized Second Amendment organizations, warning that the ruling could open the door to pretextual searches targeting gun owners.
William Trevor Case, an Army veteran with a history of mental illness, was shot by police in his own home on September 27, 2021, after officers entered without a warrant during a welfare check. Four officers in Anaconda, Montana, responded to a call from Case’s ex-girlfriend reporting that he had threatened suicide by telephone and warned he would harm police if they came to his residence. The officers deliberated outside Case’s home for approximately 40 minutes before forcing entry through an unlocked door.
During a search of the house, Case, who was hiding in an upstairs bedroom closet, pulled back a closet curtain. Sergeant Richard Pasha saw what he believed was a dark object near Case’s waist and shot Case in the arm and abdomen. Officers later recovered a handgun from a laundry basket near where Case had been hiding. Case was subsequently charged with assaulting a peace officer, and prosecutors used evidence obtained from the warrantless entry to convict him.
The Montana Supreme Court upheld the conviction in a narrow 4-3 decision, ruling that officers may enter homes without warrants when there are objective, specific and articulable facts from which an experienced officer would suspect that a citizen is in need of help or is in peril. Justice Laurie McKinnon dissented forcefully, arguing that the majority incorrectly extended the community caretaker doctrine, which derives from law enforcement’s interactions with pedestrians and vehicles, to warrantless entry of a home. She concluded that the community caretaker doctrine is not a standalone exception to the warrant requirement and does not permit warrantless entries into personal residences.
In their amicus brief, Gun Owners of America and other petitioners argued that the Montana Supreme Court’s ruling “violates this Court’s holding in Caniglia v. Strom,” by transforming the “community caretaker” doctrine into a blank check for warrantless home invasions. They warn that such reasoning erodes the Fourth Amendment’s foundation. Namely, “the primary emphasis of the Fourth Amendment is to protect property rights” and replaces it with “vague standards of reasonableness” that allow police to forcibly enter homes without probable cause.
For gun owners, the implications are dire. The brief draws a direct line to Caniglia, where police seized firearms without a warrant under the guise of caretaking, suggesting this ruling could authorize similar pretextual seizures. As GOA argues, “the community caretaking doctrine is perhaps the most troubling of those exceptions, as it could cover a wide variety of pretextual searches.” By granting police “discretion to expand their powers and diminish the protection of the People,” the Montana decision effectively places constitutional rights on the chopping block.
“The very enumeration of the right,” the brief warns, quoting Heller, “takes out of the hands of government…the power to decide on a case-by-case basis whether the right is really worth insisting upon.” For GOA and its members, this case is not just about search law—it’s about whether the Bill of Rights still restrains the state, or whether “reasonableness” becomes the new excuse for armed intrusion into American homes.
The DOJ brief explicitly states that federal officials make warrantless entries into residences in a variety of emergencies that pose a threat to life and safety. The federal government also prosecutes cases in which state or local officials making such entries have encountered evidence of a crime. This means any evidence discovered during what law enforcement deems a lawful emergency entry can be used for criminal prosecution, even if obtaining a warrant would have been impossible because no probable cause of criminal activity existed.
Broadly speaking, GOA framed the case as deciding “whether police may barge into gun owners’ homes and shoot them without a warrant during a welfare check.” The organization’s concern reflects the reality that Case was shot in his own home by officers who entered without judicial authorization, ostensibly to save his life.
Civil liberties groups supporting Case warned that allowing warrantless home entries based on mere reasonable suspicion of exigent circumstances violates the Fourth Amendment and needlessly threatens the safety of citizens and law enforcement. They argue that if the Montana Supreme Court’s decision stands, it could open the door to warrantless searches of less historically protected areas like electronic devices and accounts, producing a devastating loss of privacy for all Americans.
The Cato Institute, which filed an amicus brief in the case, emphasized that warrantless home entries based on reasonable suspicion threaten both residents and law enforcement. The organization noted that if Montana police did not have probable cause to enter Case’s home, their search should be declared unconstitutional.
The case highlights a troubling pattern where welfare checks on individuals in mental health crises escalate into violence. Research from the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions and Vanderbilt University revealed a troubling pattern: “Calls to police to check on the well-being of individuals were 74 percent more likely to be associated with fatal injury than police responses to an incident where shots had already been fired.”
For Second Amendment advocates, the implications are stark. A decision favoring Montana could allow ATF agents to enter gun owners’ homes under the pretext of welfare checks, turning routine visits into fishing expeditions for firearms violations. The Supreme Court’s ruling, expected by the end of June or early July 2026, will decide whether the Fourth Amendment’s shield against warrantless searches still stands firm or bends toward a “reasonableness” standard that critics warn could erode privacy rights across the board.
About José Niño
José Niño is a freelance writer based in Charlotte, North Carolina. You can contact him via Facebook and X/Twitter. Subscribe to his Substack newsletter by visiting “Jose Nino Unfiltered” on Substack.com.
