Archives
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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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FDsys, many district courts, other federal courts
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To search Search and Seizure on Lexis.com $ -
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General (many free):
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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)
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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)
ACLU on privacy
Privacy Foundation
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NACDL’s Domestic Drone Information Center
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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)
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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
SD: Impending surgery exigency for warrantless blood draw
Defendant’s impending surgery was an exigent circumstance for a warrantless blood draw. “We have held that imminent medical care that threatens to destroy BAC evidence through blood transfusions, intravenous fluids, or natural dissipation over time may create exigent circumstances. … … Continue reading
CA9: Gratuitous dog bite can be excessive force; no QI here
“Our precedent clearly establishes that releasing a police dog to bite a person who neither endangers officers nor attempts to flee or resist arrest violates that person’s Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable seizure. … Viewing the evidence … Continue reading
W.D.Va.: Assumption def had guest standing undermined at hearing; additional briefing ordered
While it was assumed by everyone that defendant was an overnight guest, the proof at the hearing was wanting that he was. “Here, Morris testified that she had four bedrooms in her house, two upstairs and two downstairs along with … Continue reading
NPR: Virginia Gov. Northam Signs ‘Breonna’s Law’ Banning No-Knock Warrants
NPR: Virginia Gov. Northam Signs ‘Breonna’s Law’ Banning No-Knock Warrants by Daniella Cheslow (“Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam ceremonially signed a law Monday that will prohibit police from using no-knock warrants, which allow police to enter and search a home without … Continue reading
CA9: Husband hacking wife’s work emails for divorce advantage violated SCA
Husband’s interception of his wife’s work emails for advantage in their divorce case violated the Stored Communications Act as well as her right of privacy. The district court erred in granting him summary judgment. Clare v. Clare, 19-36039 (9th Cir. … Continue reading
CA11: Even if warrantless monitoring of a package in def’s home violated 4A, inevitable discovery applies
Even if warrantless monitoring of a package into defendant’s house violated the Fourth Amendment, inevitable discovery applies. There was an intensive investigation and time was of the essence. The exclusionary rule should not be applied. United States v. Watkins, 2020 … Continue reading
LATimes: The untold story of how the Golden State Killer was found: A covert operation and private DNA
LATimes: The untold story of how the Golden State Killer was found: A covert operation and private DNA by Paige St. John:
CA3: Presumption of QI where magistrate issues SW
There is a presumption qualified immunity applies where a magistrate has signed off on a search warrant. Handy v. Palmiero, 2020 U.S. App. LEXIS 37862 (3d Cir. Dec. 4, 2020):
D.Mont.: PC for SW based on CIs was lacking, but not so bad GFE shouldn’t apply
The affidavit for search warrant actually was deficient in showing probable cause from the CIs and the concerned citizen, but it wasn’t so lacking in probable cause that the good faith exception should not apply. United States v. Stanley, 2020 … Continue reading
OH2: Officer’s asking for consent to search before inventory doesn’t make it pretextual
“Although Officer Lindsey asked White if he (the officer) could search the vehicle prior to deciding to tow the vehicle, that question alone did not require a conclusion that the subsequent inventory search was pretextual. The Dayton Police Department tow … Continue reading
W.D.Pa.: Entrapment defense for trial was speculative for possession and wouldn’t suppress SW
There was probable cause for the search warrant of defendant’s premises (a tattoo parlor) for silencers. The defense of entrapment is a trial defense, not a defense to the search warrant, especially when the charge is possession not delivery. Also, … Continue reading
CA6: Looking at hash values on images of CP didn’t expand the private search
Officers looking at the hash information on child pornography images sent from NCMEC who got them from gmail wasn’t expansion of the private search under Jacobsen and Walter. United States v. Miller, 2020 U.S. App. LEXIS 37787 (6th Cir. Dec. … Continue reading
NBC Los Angeles: LA Man Seized for ‘Latino Appearance’ Will Not be Deported
NBC Los Angeles: LA Man Seized for ‘Latino Appearance’ Will Not be Deported (“He was arrested and spent more than two months in a detention facility before getting a bond hearing, according to the ACLU.”)
VICE: The DEA Abruptly Cut-Off Its App Location Data Contract
VICE: The DEA Abruptly Cut-Off Its App Location Data Contract by Joseph Cox (“The DEA cancelled its contract with Venntel, which obtains granular location data from ordinary apps and sells access to law enforcement agencies.”)
NYTimes: Police Drones Are Starting to Think for Themselves
NYTimes: Police Drones Are Starting to Think for Themselves by Cade Metz (“In one Southern California city, flying drones with artificial intelligence are aiding investigations while presenting new civil rights questions.”)
IL: PC for open container in car permitted search of locked glove compartment
Probable cause that a vehicle had open containers in it permitted a search of the locked glove compartment because it was a place where an open container could be. People v. McGhee, 2020 IL App (3d) 180349, 2020 Ill. App. … Continue reading
IL: Ct of Apps erred in reaching 4A claim in civil discovery dispute involving state AG when it didn’t have to
This case involves a civil discovery dispute between the state and a recycling business for an environmental inspection. The court of appeals erred in jumping to a Fourth Amendment claim without attempting to decide the case on nonconstitutional grounds under … Continue reading
NH: Bringing Humane Society to aid in animal maltreatment search not unreasonable
Officers bringing along non-law enforcement Humane Society workers to aid in an animal maltreatment search warrant was reasonable. State v. Fay, 2020 N.H. LEXIS 198 (Dec. 2, 2020):
NY3: CI showed PC; GPS warrant corroborated the CI
The CI appeared and testified to the probable cause. A separate search warrant for GPS tracking corroborated the CI. People v. Jackson, 2020 NY Slip Op 07251, 2020 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 7450 (3d Dept. Dec. 3, 2020). The CI … Continue reading