A gun rights group has filed a reply brief in a federal lawsuit challenging a New Hampshire high school administration’s decision to search an 18-year-old student’s vehicle based on his lawful semi-automatic rifle ownership.

Background

The brief was filed August 5, 2026, in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Hampshire in the case Harrington v. Crawford. The lawsuit stems from an October incident involving Jack Harrington, then a senior at Hillsboro-Deering High School.

According to court filings, school officials searched Harrington’s truck while it was parked on school grounds. Harrington lawfully owns a semi-automatic rifle and had occasionally kept it in his vehicle outside of school hours, but state and federal records indicate he did not bring the firearm onto school property.

Arguments

Attorneys for Harrington state that district officials initiated an interrogation and conducted the vehicle search without proper consent or reasonable suspicion after learning of his off-campus semi-automatic rifle ownership.

“The school’s knowledge that Jack was a lawful semi-automatic rifle owner outside of school did not justify their search of his truck,” said SAF Senior Director of Legal Operations Bill Sack. “They had no information to indicate he had ever brought the semi-automatic rifle to school or had done anything illegal or against school policy whatsoever. The search they conducted could not have been supported by probable cause or even reasonable suspicion.”

In the legal filing, the foundation argued that the legal burden rests on the defendants to prove that voluntary consent was provided without duress.

“Consent obtained by coercion is invalid ‘no matter how subtly the coercion was applied,’” the brief states, citing federal precedent.

Next Steps

The case remains pending before U.S. District Court Judge Joseph N. Laplante.

Original reporting: Tampa Free Press — read the source article.