Defending Felony Camping Charges After the Grants Pass Decision

On June 28, 2026, Nashville prosecutors filed two felony camping counts against Joseph Williams, the two-year anniversary of Grants Pass. He spent nine days in jail before the case was dismissed on a plea, which matters to defense counsel because the charge moved fast enough to create jail time and plea pressure before any cleaner appellate theory had time to mature [1].

Tennessee's statute changes the stakes

Williams was charged under Tennessee Code section 39-14-414, the Equal Access to Public Property Act. As written now, it makes camping on public property a Class E felony, punishable by up to six years in prison, a $3,000 fine, and loss of voting rights. The law began as a misdemeanor in 2012, was expanded to a felony for state land in 2020, and then extended to all public property in 2022 [2].

That is not an ordinance-level nuisance case. It changes the leverage immediately. A client is no longer deciding whether to contest a citation; the client is facing a felony record with collateral consequences that can outlast the underlying camp, the tent, or the arresting sweep.

The Tennessee filing also fits a wider pattern. By June 2026, the National Homelessness Law Center said more than 350 cities and 14 states had passed or strengthened anti-camping criminalization measures, and Housing Not Handcuffs was tracking 22 states that had introduced or considered similar laws as of April 2026 [5][6]. CalMatters separately reported steep enforcement spikes in sampled California jurisdictions, including a 500% increase in San Francisco, 68% in Los Angeles, and 15x in Stockton [7].

Grants Pass narrowed one route, not the case

In Grants Pass v. Johnson, the Supreme Court held 6-3 that the Eighth Amendment does not bar enforcement of generally applicable camping ordinances. That did not end the defense side of the case. The majority left necessity defenses in play, and the dissent pointed to Due Process, Equal Protection, and Fourth Amendment questions that the decision did not resolve [3][4].

The defenses that still matter

Necessity is still live

Necessity is the most immediate argument when the client is being punished for sleeping because there was nowhere else to go. It is not automatic, and it does not survive on moral force alone. Counsel has to build the facts early: shelter availability, weather, safety, medical needs, and any real options the client had at the time. If that record is thin, the argument turns into rhetoric. If the record is developed before the case hardens, the court has to confront whether the prosecution is treating unavoidable conduct as ordinary criminality [3][4].

Sweeps often raise Fourth Amendment problems

Encampment enforcement often involves more than the camping allegation. Tents, bedding, medication, identification, and other survival property may be seized when officers clear an area, and those seizures can raise Fourth Amendment questions even when the Eighth Amendment no longer helps. For defense lawyers, the useful questions are concrete: who took what, under what authority, and whether the record shows a warrant, consent, or some other lawful basis.

Due process and equal protection still do work

The due process and equal protection theories are less dramatic than a broad constitutional ban, but they survive because the client still has a right to notice, non-arbitrary enforcement, and a rational explanation for why one person sleeping in public is charged while another is not. These arguments usually become stronger when the enforcement pattern is messy, selective, or poorly documented [4].

State law can still narrow the case

State courts are not locked into the same result everywhere. A Kentucky state court ruling in May 2026 struck down a statewide camping ban on state constitutional grounds, which is a reminder that Grants Pass does not control every state-law theory. Indiana now gives defense counsel a different kind of statutory argument: its law took effect on July 1, 2026, treats camping on public property as a Class C misdemeanor, caps punishment at 60 days and a $500 fine, and includes a safe harbor if no shelter is available within five miles [8].

The penalty ladder is still moving

Tennessee is still the harshest example in this group, but it is not isolated. Other states are experimenting with different punishment levels and enforcement tools, which means the defense analysis starts with the exact statute, not with a general reaction to the phrase "camping ban."

What counsel has to do early

• Move before the case settles into a plea posture.
• Test the charging instrument against the statute line by line.
• Build the record on shelter access, property seizures, and need-based facts immediately.
• Preserve necessity, due process, equal protection, Fourth Amendment, and state-law arguments even if the trial court looks unfriendly.

Grants Pass made felony camping charges easier to bring, not impossible to defend. The first wave of enforcement is when sloppy records harden into permanent ones, so the useful work has to happen early, while the case is still a case and not just a plea with a docket number.

References

1. A homeless man was charged with a felony for camping. He's one of the first — WSIU, July 21, 2026
2. Tennessee Code § 39-14-414 — Justia Tennessee Code
3. Justices uphold laws targeting homelessness with criminal penalties — SCOTUSblog, June 2024
4. Criminalization of Homelessness and Poverty Post-Grants Pass — American Bar Association, March 2025
5. Two years since Grants Pass ruling, 350+ cities, 14 states... — National Homelessness Law Center, June 25, 2026
6. 20+ states introduced anti-homeless laws — Housing Not Handcuffs, April 1, 2026
7. Data show spike in homeless-related arrests, citations in CA cities — CalMatters, June 2025
8. Homeless people camping on public property could face criminal charges under new law — WFYI, April 22, 2026
9. Louisiana Governor signs one of the country's cruelest anti-homeless laws — National Homelessness Law Center, June 2026