In a recurring, painful issue, the Fifth Circuit agreed with the majority approach in finding that it was not an unconstitutional taking of property to damage a landowner’s house when that was necessary to apprehend an armed criminal intent on shooting it out with the police. Baker v. City of McKinney, 84 F.4th 378 (5th Cir. 2023), reh’g denied, 93 F.4th 251 (5th Cir. 2024). This was an “active emergency” that made it “objectively necessary’ to damage or destroy the property to prevent imminent harm to persons. Public emergency allows the government to damage or destroy property without compensation.
The Fifth Circuit justified the result as based on history and longstanding tradition, as well as precedent both before and after adoption of the Constitution.