Archives
-
Recent Posts
- Cal.L.Rev.: Your Robotaxi Is Watching You. Does the Fourth Amendment Care?
- D.Alaska: With a SW for a cell phone, officers should ask, not make, def to open the phone with his finger
- CA2: Statement there was CP on computer was PC to seize it for a SW
- S.D.Iowa: Cell phone search for info on drugs and guns didn’t need second warrant when sex offenses stumbled upon
- N.D.N.Y.: DNA by SW in FL in CODIS could be used in NY; defense counsel not IAC for not making def’s argument
-
Feedspot’s Best Legal Blogs and Websites 2023-2026,
also, firm website Top 90 Criminal Law Blogs 2026 -
-
ABA Journal Web 100, Best Law Blogs (2015-17) (then discontinued)
-
-
by John Wesley Hall
Criminal Defense Lawyer and
Search and seizure law consultant
Little Rock, Arkansas
Contact: forhall @ aol.com
Search and Seizure (6th ed. 2025)
www.johnwesleyhall.com -
© 2003-26,
online since Feb. 24, 2003 Approx. 600,000 visits (non-robot) since 2012 Approx. 50,000 posts since 2003 (29,000 on WordPress as of 12/31/25) -
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Fourth Amendment cases, citations, and links -
Latest Slip Opinions:
U.S. Supreme Court (Home)
S.Ct. Shadow Docket Database
Federal Appellate Courts Opinions
First Circuit
Second Circuit
Third Circuit
Fourth Circuit
Fifth Circuit
Sixth Circuit
Seventh Circuit
Eighth Circuit
Ninth Circuit
Tenth Circuit
Eleventh Circuit
D.C. Circuit
Federal Circuit
Foreign Intell.Surv.Ct.
FDsys, many district courts, other federal courts
Military Courts: C.A.A.F., Army, AF, N-M, CG, SF
State courts (and some USDC opinions)
Google Scholar
Advanced Google Scholar
Google search tips
LexisWeb
LII State Appellate Courts
LexisONE free caselaw
Findlaw Free Opinions
To search Search and Seizure on Lexis.com $ -
Research Links:
Supreme Court:
SCOTUSBlog
S. Ct. Docket
Solicitor General's site
SCOTUSreport
Briefs online (but no amicus briefs)
Oyez Project (NWU)
"On the Docket"–Medill
S.Ct. Monitor: Law.com
S.Ct. Com't'ry: Law.com
-
General (many free):
LexisWeb
Google Scholar | Google
LexisOne Legal Website Directory
Crimelynx
Lexis.com $
Lexis.com (criminal law/ 4th Amd) $
Findlaw.com
Findlaw.com (4th Amd)
Westlaw.com $
F.R.Crim.P. 41
www.fd.org
Federal Law Enforcement Training Center Resources
FBI Domestic Investigations and Operations Guide (2008) (pdf)
DEA Agents Manual (2002) (download)
DOJ Computer Search Manual (2009) (pdf)
Stringrays (ACLU No. Cal.) (pdf)
-
Congressional Research Service:
--Electronic Communications Privacy Act (2012)
--Overview of the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (2012)
--Outline of Federal Statutes Governing Wiretapping and Electronic Eavesdropping (2012)
--Federal Statutes Governing Wiretapping and Electronic Eavesdropping (2012)
--Federal Laws Relating to Cybersecurity: Discussion of Proposed Revisions (2012)
ACLU on privacy
Privacy Foundation
Electronic Frontier Foundation
NACDL’s Domestic Drone Information Center
Electronic Privacy Information Center
Criminal Appeal (post-conviction) (9th Cir.)
Section 1983 Blog -
"If it was easy, everybody would be doing it. It isn't, and they don't."
—Me -
"Life is not a matter of holding good cards, but of playing a poor hand well."
–Josh Billings (pseudonym of Henry Wheeler Shaw), Josh Billings on Ice, and Other Things (1868) (erroneously attributed to Robert Louis Stevenson, among others) -
“I am still learning.”
—Domenico Giuntalodi (but misattributed to Michelangelo Buonarroti (common phrase throughout 1500's)). -
"Love work; hate mastery over others; and avoid intimacy with the government."
—Shemaya, in the Thalmud -
"It is a pleasant world we live in, sir, a very pleasant world. There are bad people in it, Mr. Richard, but if there were no bad people, there would be no good lawyers."
—Charles Dickens, “The Old Curiosity Shop ... With a Frontispiece. From a Painting by Geo. Cattermole, Etc.” 255 (1848) -
"A system of law that not only makes certain conduct criminal, but also lays down rules for the conduct of the authorities, often becomes complex in its application to individual cases, and will from time to time produce imperfect results, especially if one's attention is confined to the particular case at bar. Some criminals do go free because of the necessity of keeping government and its servants in their place. That is one of the costs of having and enforcing a Bill of Rights. This country is built on the assumption that the cost is worth paying, and that in the long run we are all both freer and safer if the Constitution is strictly enforced."
—Williams v. Nix, 700 F. 2d 1164, 1173 (8th Cir. 1983) (Richard Sheppard Arnold, J.), rev'd Nix v. Williams, 467 US. 431 (1984). -
"The criminal goes free, if he must, but it is the law that sets him free. Nothing can destroy a government more quickly than its failure to observe its own laws, or worse, its disregard of the charter of its own existence."
—Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U.S. 643, 659 (1961). -
"Any costs the exclusionary rule are costs imposed directly by the Fourth Amendment."
—Yale Kamisar, 86 Mich.L.Rev. 1, 36 n. 151 (1987). -
"There have been powerful hydraulic pressures throughout our history that bear heavily on the Court to water down constitutional guarantees and give the police the upper hand. That hydraulic pressure has probably never been greater than it is today."
— Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 39 (1968) (Douglas, J., dissenting). -
"The great end, for which men entered into society, was to secure their property."
—Entick v. Carrington, 19 How.St.Tr. 1029, 1066, 95 Eng. Rep. 807 (C.P. 1765) -
"It is a fair summary of history to say that the safeguards of liberty have frequently been forged in controversies involving not very nice people. And so, while we are concerned here with a shabby defrauder, we must deal with his case in the context of what are really the great themes expressed by the Fourth Amendment."
—United States v. Rabinowitz, 339 U.S. 56, 69 (1950) (Frankfurter, J., dissenting) -
"The course of true law pertaining to searches and seizures, as enunciated here, has not–to put it mildly–run smooth."
—Chapman v. United States, 365 U.S. 610, 618 (1961) (Frankfurter, J., concurring). -
"A search is a search, even if it happens to disclose nothing but the bottom of a turntable."
—Arizona v. Hicks, 480 U.S. 321, 325 (1987) -
"For the Fourth Amendment protects people, not places. What a person knowingly exposes to the public, even in his own home or office, is not a subject of Fourth Amendment protection. ... But what he seeks to preserve as private, even in an area accessible to the public, may be constitutionally protected."
—Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 351 (1967) -
“Experience should teach us to be most on guard to protect liberty when the Government’s purposes are beneficent. Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty by evil-minded
rulers. The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well-meaning but without understanding.”
—United States v. Olmstead, 277 U.S. 438, 479 (1925) (Brandeis, J., dissenting)
-
“Liberty—the freedom from unwarranted intrusion by government—is as easily lost through insistent nibbles by government officials who seek to do their jobs too well as by those whose purpose it is to oppress; the piranha can be as deadly as the shark.”
—United States v. $124,570, 873 F.2d 1240, 1246 (9th Cir. 1989) -
"You can't always get what you want / But if you try sometimes / You just might find / You get what you need."
—Mick Jagger & Keith Richards, Let it Bleed (album, 1969) -
"In Germany, they first came for the communists,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a communist. Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for
the Catholics and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Catholic. Then they came
for me–and by that time there was nobody left to speak up."
—Martin Niemöller (1945) [he served seven years in a concentration camp] -
“Children grow up thinking the adult world is ordered, rational, fit for purpose. It’s crap. Becoming a man is realising that it’s all rotten. Realising how to celebrate that rottenness, that’s freedom.”
– John le Carré, The Night Manager (1993), line by Richard Roper -
"The point of the Fourth Amendment, which often is not grasped by zealous officers, is not that it denies law enforcement the support of the usual inferences which reasonable men draw from evidence. Its protection consists in requiring that those inferences be drawn by a neutral and detached magistrate instead of being judged by the officer engaged in the often competitive enterprise of ferreting out crime."
—Johnson v. United States, 333 U.S. 10, 13-14 (1948) -
The book was dedicated in the first (1982) and sixth (2025) editions to Justin William Hall (1975-2025). He was three when this project started in 1978.
Website design by Wally Waller, Colorado Springs. 
Author Archives: Hall
D.N.J.: No REP in one’s name
There is no reasonable expectation of privacy in one’s name. Livingstone v. Hugo Boss Store, 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 165848 (D.N.J. Sept. 1, 2021). Officers working off duty security came upon decedent’s car at night parked across parking spaces, and … Continue reading
W.D.Mo.: RS def was in violation of order of protection justified vehicle stop
Reasonable suspicion defendant was driving a car with a child in it in violation of an order of protection was justification for his stop. When the car was stopped, the smell of marijuana justified its further search. United States v. … Continue reading
CA11: RS included talking on phone during stop when repeatedly told to hang up
Defendant’s excessive nervousness, denial that some of the contents of the car were even his, and repeatedly talking on the phone with someone the officer suspected was coaching him what to do and say even after being repeatedly told to … Continue reading
TN: “Highly likely” information is sufficient for PC
The provider of the IP address could not tell police for certain that defendant had the particular IP address at the particular time sought, but they could opine it was highly likely. That’s certainly enough for probable cause. Defendant’s certified … Continue reading
CA9: Govt proved inevitable discovery of victims despite suppressing search of motel room
The officers’ investigation had progressed enough to have embarked on a course to readily identify defendant’s victims before the illegal search of the motel room. The government proved inevitable discovery. In addition, this wasn’t so flagrant, despite the granting of … Continue reading
D.Conn.: A concealed carry permit is not cause for handcuffing a motorist
A concealed carry permit is not cause for handcuffing a motorist. Soukaneh v. Andrzejewski, 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 147750 (D.Conn. Aug. 6, 2021). The lack of an arrest warrant isn’t relevant in an excessive force case where officers came to … Continue reading
The Atlantic: Your Phone Is Your Private Space
The Atlantic: Your Phone Is Your Private Space (“Without evidence of wrongdoing, neither public agents nor private companies should be rifling through the photos on your personal devices.”)
CA10: An order to get out of a car does not unreasonably prolong the stop
An order to get out of a car does not unreasonably prolong the stop. United States v. Malone, 2021 U.S. App. LEXIS 26136 (10th Cir. Aug. 30, 2021). Summarizing the law:
WaPo: Prince George’s officer accused of erasing cellphone as agents executed search warrant
WaPo: Prince George’s officer accused of erasing cellphone as agents executed search warrant by Katie Mettler (“Edward “Scott” Finn, a former Prince George’s County police officer who faced previous allegations of misconduct, has been indicted by a federal grand jury … Continue reading
ABAJ: Chemerinsky: The Supreme Court has done a poor job protecting against police abuse of power and racism
ABAJ: Chemerinsky: The Supreme Court has done a poor job protecting against police abuse of power and racism by Erwin Chemerinsky:
Raw Story: Mo Brooks bellyaches about Congress seizing his phone records: ‘They should not have access to anything’
Raw Story: Mo Brooks bellyaches about Congress seizing his phone records: ‘They should not have access to anything’ by David Edwards:
CA10: Order to get out of car doesn’t unreasonably extend stop
The officer’s order for defendant to get out of the car was reasonable and did not unreasonably prolong the stop. United States v. Malone, 2021 U.S. App. LEXIS 26136 (10th Cir. Aug. 30, 2021). “While Fisk brings his assignment of … Continue reading
CA11: Govt filter team for review of seized materials not per se unreasonable; stringent protocol followed
The use of a government filter time to review seized materials implicating the attorney-client privilege is not per se unreasonable. The USMJ ordered compliance with a more stringent protocol than approved in other cases. Injunction denied. In re Sealed Search … Continue reading
IL: Def’s personal relationship to premises to be searched is relevant and has to be viewed in the context of the totality
Nexus for the premises was shown in the search warrant affidavit. Defendant’s personal relationship to the premises is relevant and has to be evaluated in context of the totality. On sufficiency of the evidence, however, defendant’s conviction is reversed for … Continue reading
NYT: When Police Lie, the Innocent Pay. Some Are Fighting Back.
NYT: When Police Lie, the Innocent Pay. Some Are Fighting Back. (“Video from body cameras, doorbells and cellphones is revealing discrepancies between what police officers report and what actually happened.”)
SC authorizes video or phone oath and presentation of SW affidavits
Remote communication technology has been used for court proceedings under Covid. It is expressly authorized for many other proceedings, including issuance of search warrants. The swearing of the affiant can be remote. Use of Remote Communications Technology, 2021 S.C. LEXIS … Continue reading
S.D.N.Y.: Search of DOC employee’s papers for drug soaked paper on entering prison was reasonable
Search of a NYC DOC employee’s belongings for drug soaked paper after passing the metal detector at Riker’s Island was reasonable either under special needs or because there is no reasonable expectation of privacy and it’s not even a Fourth … Continue reading
CA10: Changing argument on a Carpenter remand is waiver
Defendant was the subject of a pre-Carpenter CSLI production, and his case was GVR’ed in light of Carpenter. On remand in the District Court he raised a new issue which the court finds waived. “We conclude that the district court … Continue reading