New Hampshire school officials have formally admitted that they violated former student Jack Harrington’s Fourth Amendment rights when they searched his pickup truck after learning that he lawfully owned a handgun.
The admission resolves Harrington v. Crawford, a federal lawsuit supported by the Second Amendment Foundation. In a stipulated declaratory judgment, Hillsboro-Deering School District Superintendent Jennifer Crawford and Hillsboro-Deering High School Principal James O’Rourke agreed that the April 24, 2025, search of Harrington’s truck and glove box was unconstitutional.
The agreement also states that the search failed to satisfy the lower “reasonable suspicion” standard used for ordinary school searches and that Harrington had committed no illegal or unlawful conduct that justified it.
Most importantly for gun owners, the judgment recognizes that exercising the Second Amendment cannot become the government’s excuse to disregard the Fourth.
“A search of a student’s person, property, or vehicle based solely on the exercise of a constitutional or legal right,” including the right to keep and bear arms, would violate the Fourth Amendment, the agreement states.
Lawful Gun Ownership Became the Excuse for a Search
Harrington was an 18-year-old senior when school officials pulled him from class and questioned him about a handgun he lawfully owned and possessed away from school property.
The controversy began after an assistant coach overheard Harrington discussing an earlier traffic stop with another student. Harrington had lawfully stored his Glock 43 in his truck’s glove box during that off-campus encounter. The coach did not report hearing Harrington say that he possessed the firearm at school.
Nevertheless, the conversation was relayed through school employees until administrators treated Harrington’s lawful gun ownership as grounds to search his truck on campus.
As AmmoLand previously reported, officials brought Harrington into a small office where a uniformed and visibly armed school resource officer stood near the only door. Harrington repeatedly denied having a firearm at school and refused permission to search his vehicle. His parents likewise refused consent over the phone.
School officials searched the truck anyway. They found no firearm because Harrington’s handgun was safely stored at his family’s home.
“Maintaining safety on school grounds is a laudable goal,” SAF Executive Director Adam Kraut said. “But the Constitution demands that school officials have, at minimum, reasonable suspicion to search a student’s property. Critically, choosing to exercise one’s Second Amendment rights cannot be interpreted as a waiver of your rights under the Fourth Amendment, nor can it create reasonable suspicion of a crime.”
“Anything Above Zero” Was Not Reasonable Suspicion
The agreement delivers the answer to the extraordinary position revealed during the case’s discovery phase.
In August, Assistant Principal Brian McGinn testified that a possibility “above zero”, even a one-percent chance, could support reasonable suspicion. O’Rourke reportedly acknowledged that his asserted suspicion rested on “speculation or guess.”
That theory would have placed every student known to hunt, shoot competitively, visit a gun range or live in a gun-owning household under permanent suspicion. The stipulated judgment rejects it as applied to Harrington: the search did not meet the Supreme Court’s reasonable-suspicion standard under New Jersey v. T.L.O.
The Constitution does not permit government officials to transform lawful conduct into evidence of a crime. A citizen does not surrender one enumerated right by exercising another.
“Publicly acknowledging that you’re a gun owner does not justify endless harassment or subject you to invasive searches,” SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb said. “Simply choosing to exercise your rights under the Second Amendment does not imply that you may do something criminal with a firearm and does not create reasonable suspicion that a crime has been committed.”
A Clear Victory, With a Defined Scope
The stipulated judgment is a substantial victory for Harrington and SAF, but it should not be confused with a nationwide appellate precedent issued after a contested ruling. Crawford and O’Rourke agreed to the declaration as part of a settlement, and the document says it does not bind them or the school district in matters involving different students under different facts.
The agreement also states that Crawford and O’Rourke acted with a good-faith belief that their conduct complied with the law and out of concern for student and staff safety. The terms of the parties’ separate settlement agreement were not included in the publicly available judgment, and the federal action is dismissed with prejudice.
Those limitations do not erase what the officials formally conceded in Harrington’s case: the search was unconstitutional, reasonable suspicion was absent and Harrington did nothing illegal to justify it.
Lawful gun ownership is not evidence of wrongdoing, and the Second Amendment is not a waiver of the Fourth.
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About Duncan Johnson:
Duncan Johnson is a lifelong firearms enthusiast and unwavering defender of the Second Amendment—where “shall not be infringed” means exactly what it says. A graduate of George Mason University, he enjoys competing in local USPSA and multi-gun competitions whenever he’s not covering the latest in gun rights and firearm policy. Duncan is a regular contributor and editor-in-chief for AmmoLand News and is responsible for AmmoLand’s daily gun-rights reporting and industry coverage.
