Lange v. California
The Supreme Court ruled that police chasing someone suspected of a minor crime cannot automatically enter that person's home without a warrant — officers must be able to point to a specific emergency, such as a risk of violence, escape, or destruction of evidence, beyond the mere fact of the chase.
The decision requires police nationwide to weigh the circumstances of each misdemeanor pursuit rather than applying a blanket rule, while still allowing warrantless home entry whenever a genuine emergency is present.
“We hold it does not. A great many misdemeanor pursuits involve exigencies allowing warrantless entry. But whether a given one does so turns on the particular facts of the case.”
The Court's core holding rejecting a blanket rule and requiring case-by-case emergency analysis for misdemeanor pursuits.
How it got here: A California superior court denied Lange's motion to suppress; the California Court of Appeal affirmed using a categorical pro-entry rule; the California Supreme Court declined review; the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear the case to resolve a split among courts nationwide.
The Case in Depth
What happened
Arthur Lange was driving in Sonoma, California, with his windows down and music blaring when a highway patrol officer signaled him to pull over. Instead of stopping, Lange drove the short remaining distance to his house and pulled into his attached garage. The officer followed him inside without a warrant, questioned him, and administered field sobriety tests after observing signs of intoxication. A blood test later showed Lange's blood-alcohol level was more than three times the legal limit. He was charged with the misdemeanor of driving under the influence.
The question before the Court
Can police automatically follow a fleeing misdemeanor suspect into their home without a warrant, or must they first identify a specific emergency beyond the pursuit itself?
The Court's answer
No — police chasing a misdemeanor suspect cannot automatically enter that person's home without a warrant. The Court rejected the flat rule that any misdemeanor pursuit is itself a sufficient emergency to justify warrantless home entry. Instead, officers must evaluate the full circumstances of each individual chase before deciding whether to go in without a warrant.
Officers can still enter without a warrant when a real emergency accompanies the pursuit — for example, a genuine risk that the suspect will destroy evidence, escape through another exit, or harm someone inside. In many misdemeanor chases, the Court acknowledged, some such emergency will exist. But the bare fact of running inside is not enough on its own. When no specific emergency applies, officers must take the time to obtain a warrant, even if it means pausing at the threshold.
Curious how the Court got there? See the step-by-step legal reasoning →
Why it matters
Police pursuing someone suspected of a misdemeanor — a DUI, a traffic offense, a noise complaint — can no longer enter that person's home simply because the person ran inside. Officers must identify a real, specific emergency to justify warrantless entry. Homeowners gain stronger Fourth Amendment protection against warrantless police entries arising from minor-crime pursuits, and law enforcement agencies nationwide must retrain officers on the new standard.
What changes now
The case returns to California courts, which must determine whether specific emergency circumstances — beyond the fact that Lange drove into his garage — existed to justify the warrantless entry. If no such emergency is found, the evidence of intoxication may be suppressed. More broadly, police departments across the country will need to adjust training and protocols to ensure officers evaluate misdemeanor pursuits for genuine emergencies before entering a home without a warrant.
What this does not decide
The ruling does not resolve whether the evidence against Lange will ultimately be suppressed — that question returns to California courts. It also leaves undisturbed the existing rule that police may always enter a home without a warrant when chasing a fleeing felony suspect. Justice Thomas separately argued the exclusionary rule would not require suppression here regardless of the entry's legality.
Concurrences and dissents
Concurrence — Justice Kavanaugh
Justice Kavanaugh joined the majority but wrote separately to minimize the practical gap between the majority's approach and Chief Justice Roberts's. He noted that Lange's own attorney conceded at oral argument that warrantless entry would still be justified 'nine times out of 10 or more' in misdemeanor pursuit cases, because genuine emergencies almost always accompany flight. He also joined Justice Thomas's argument that the exclusionary rule should not require suppression in hot-pursuit cases.
Concurrence in part — Justice Thomas
Justice Thomas joined the majority except for Part II-A and wrote separately on two points. First, he noted that history supports several categorical exceptions to the case-by-case rule — including pursuit of escaped arrestees, those who committed an affray (public fighting), and certain offenses likely to lead to serious harm — and cautioned the majority's general rule does not foreclose those historical exceptions. Second, he argued that even if an officer's warrantless entry was unlawful, the federal exclusionary rule should not automatically require suppressing the evidence obtained, because the costs of exclusion outweigh its deterrent benefits when suspects benefit from their own flight.
Concurrence — Justice Roberts
Chief Justice Roberts, joined by Justice Alito, argued that hot pursuit of any fleeing suspect — whether charged with a misdemeanor or a felony — is itself a categorical exigent circumstance justifying warrantless home entry. He contended this was consistent with decades of precedent, offered a workable rule for officers in the field, and warned that the majority's case-by-case standard is dangerously vague and nearly impossible to apply in the heat of a pursuit. He agreed to vacate the lower court's ruling only because that court had applied a different categorical rule, and he would have sent the case back for application of his broader hot-pursuit rule.
How the Court got there
The legal reasoning, step by step
- The Fourth Amendment's warrant requirement applies with full force to home entries. The Court has long recognized an exception for 'exigent circumstances' — genuine emergencies that create a compelling law enforcement need with no time to get a warrant. Critically, this exception has always been evaluated case by case, looking at the totality of each situation rather than by applying a blanket rule.
- The central question was whether a single categorical rule should govern misdemeanor pursuits: does the fact that a misdemeanor suspect runs inside a home always constitute an exigency? The Court rejected that approach, noting that its precedents consistently call for case-specific emergency assessments rather than automatic rules.
- The 1976 Santana decision — which upheld warrantless home entry during a drug-dealing (felony) pursuit — was distinguished, not extended. The Court had already acknowledged in Stanton v. Sims (2013) that the law on misdemeanor hot pursuit was unsettled, explicitly reserving the question for a future case.
- Misdemeanors span an enormous range: from violent assaults down to littering, noisy parties, and artificially coloring live chicks. Welsh v. Wisconsin (1984) established that when only a minor offense is involved, officers usually do not face the kind of emergency that justifies warrantless home entry. Adding flight changes that calculus somewhat — but not enough to justify a universal rule, because some misdemeanor chases involve no real danger or risk of escape.
- Historical common law reinforced the same conclusion. English and colonial law recognized a categorical rule allowing warrantless home entry in pursuit of felons, but for misdemeanors the authorities consistently made entry depend on circumstances — whether the situation created a genuine danger of violence or harm. No treatise endorsed a blanket rule permitting entry for every misdemeanor pursuit.
- The Court therefore established that officers must assess each misdemeanor pursuit on its own facts. When imminent violence, destruction of evidence, or escape from the home is reasonably at risk, officers may enter without a warrant. When those circumstances are absent, the home's constitutional protection holds and officers must get a warrant before crossing the threshold.
Doctrinal impact
Cases affected by this decision
Distinguishes United States v. Santana (427 U. S. 38)
Santana's hot-pursuit rule is limited to felony suspects and says nothing about misdemeanor chases.
Reaffirms Welsh v. Wisconsin (466 U. S. 740)
Minor offenses rarely create the emergency needed to justify warrantless home entry; that principle now applies to misdemeanor pursuits.