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Recent Posts
- C.D.Cal.: A Gerstein/McLaughlin violation for delayed first appearance requires a showing of prejudice
- CA11: Franks motion properly denied for lack of an offer of proof
- 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
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Feedspot’s Best Legal Blogs and Websites 2023-2026,
also, firm website Top 90 Criminal Law Blogs 2026 -
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ABA Journal Web 100, Best Law Blogs (2015-17) (then discontinued)
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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) -
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Fourth Amendment cases, citations, and links -
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To search Search and Seizure on Lexis.com $ -
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General (many free):
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Federal Law Enforcement Training Center Resources
FBI Domestic Investigations and Operations Guide (2008) (pdf)
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Stringrays (ACLU No. Cal.) (pdf)
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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)
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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)
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“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
N.D.Ind.: PC doesn’t require actual showing of a crime
There was probable cause to stop defendant’s truck: “Probable cause is ‘not a high bar.’ Kaley v. United States, 571 U.S. 320, 338, 134 S. Ct. 1090, 188 L. Ed. 2d 46 (2014). It ‘does not require an actual showing … Continue reading
N.D.Iowa: Ten day delay in getting SW for def’s car where he was in custody and investigation was ongoing was not unreasonable
There was probable cause for the search and seizure of defendant’s vehicle for evidence of a violent crime. The fact a plain view wasn’t possible at the moment of the stop doesn’t mean there wasn’t. The police department with the … Continue reading
D.Colo.: Federal law criminalizing marijuana makes dog sniff in recreational use state reasonable
Even though Colorado has decriminalized personal use of marijuana, a dog sniff is still reasonable under federal law because possession of marijuana is still a violation of federal law because it’s unlawful for “any purpose.” United States v. Spikes, 2021 … Continue reading
N.D.Ill.: Sender of package whose name wasn’t on it had standing
Defendant who orchestrated delivery of a package whose name wasn’t on it as sender or recipient had standing in the package. United States v. Williams, 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 88747 (N.D. Ill. May 10, 2021):
CA8: A mere hunch possession of something might be criminal was not “immediately apparent” for plain view
Alleged plain view of glass vials on defendant’s couch wasn’t a legitimate plain view because the alleged incriminating nature of the objects wasn’t immediately apparent. It was maybe a hunch and not obvious at all. Grant of suppression motion affirmed. … Continue reading
ABA, CJS: The Myth of Objectivity in Fourth Amendment Jurisprudence
Juval O. Scott, The Myth of Objectivity in Fourth Amendment Jurisprudence, 36 Criminal Justice 13 (No. 1 Spring 2021):
N.D.Tex.: Motion to suppress 2½ months of pole camera recording untimely
The reasonableness of 2½ months of pole camera observation of defendant’s house was waived by not filing a motion to suppress until after the First Circuit granted en banc review on that issue and then a month later. United States … Continue reading
PA: Stop for no LPN permitted running names of occupants
Not having a license plate justified defendant’s stop and then running names. Commonwealth v. Malloy, 2021 PA Super 90, 2021 Pa. Super. LEXIS 278 (May 7, 2021). The backup light being on while driving justifies a stop. People v. Ambrose, … Continue reading
FL2: Open container city code violation justifies SI
An open container in violation of municipal ordinance justifies a search incident in Florida. State v. Coleman, 2021 Fla. App. LEXIS 6497 (Fla. 2d DCA May 7, 2021):
CA7: Possibility an interloper put drug residue in trash out for collection doesn’t negate PC or what it might prove
The fact it’s possible that someone else could have dropped drug residue in defendant’s trash container at the street doesn’t negate probable cause. [It also shows the lack of a reasonable expectation of privacy in trash containers at the street.] … Continue reading
Cal.6: Fire capt’s search of cabinet of backyard shed unrelated to house fire wasn’t part of the exigency of the fire
A fire department captain in Santa Clara County searched a cabinet in a shed behind defendant’s house. The fire department was called to a house fire. He was looking for the source of smoke, and it wasn’t readily apparent the … Continue reading
VI: Def walking into apt being searched with SW could be searched
Defendant who walked into an apartment being searched under a warrant could be searched himself, including the grocery bag he was carrying. People v. Matthias, 2021 V.I. LEXIS 23 (Apr. 30, 2021). Defendant’s backpack in the car couldn’t be searched … Continue reading
CA8: Def’s contradicting suppression hearing testimony at trial opened him to cross-examination on it
Where defendant’s testimony of his connection to the car materially changed between the suppression hearing and trial, the government could cross examine him on the contradictions under Simmons. United States v. Navarette, 2021 U.S. App. LEXIS 13458 (8th Cir. May … Continue reading
WY: Where the stop exceeds its purpose and becomes unreasonable, the fact it’s de minimus doesn’t make it reasonable
Where the stop exceeded reasonableness, the district court’s finding it was de minimus was error. It was less than the time for the dog sniff, but the dog had time to arrive. Mahaffy v. State, 2021 Wyo. LEXIS 71 (May … Continue reading
CA2: Failure to promptly return property lawfully seized isn’t separate 4A claim
Where firearms were lawfully seized, there isn’t a separate Fourth Amendment claim for failure to promptly return them. Bello v. Rockland Cty., 2021 U.S. App. LEXIS 13281 (2d Cir. May 5, 2021). Probable cause is required for administrative subpoenas under … Continue reading
CA11: 24 officers raiding wrong house subject to QI
24 officers raiding the wrong house [somehow] are entitled to qualified immunity. Norris v. Hicks, 2021 U.S. App. LEXIS 13272 (11th Cir. May 5, 2021):
N.D.Ind.: Affidavit for SW doesn’t have to provide the particularity, but it can if incorporated
The search warrant here is directed at a place and it’s not required to tie a person to it, unless it aids particularity. The affidavit for the warrant does not need to be particular but the warrant itself does. The … Continue reading
LATimes: The FBI raided her home to find Nancy Pelosi’s laptop. But was she the wrong woman?
LATimes: The FBI raided her home to find Nancy Pelosi’s laptop. But was she the wrong woman? (Homer, AK, because she looked like the alleged thief)