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- Reason: Miami Sheriff Hired a Private Law Firm To Pursue—and Profit From—Asset Forfeiture Cases
- D.Conn.: Pole camera on def’s house and curtilage didn’t show inside house, so it’s reasonable
- OH12: Officer’s violation of knock-and-announce statute justifies suppression
- Reason: Documents Reveal the Postal Service’s Broad Surveillance of Political Activists
- CA4: Not having child in a booster seat justified stop
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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)
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
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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
D.Ariz.: A dog sniff of the person at the border is not “non-routine”
Defendant crossed into the U.S. at a pedestrian border crossing. A dog sniff of the person was conducted. “The Court finds that the intrusiveness of the canine search did not rise to the level of a non-routine search, which would … Continue reading
CA10: Photographing partially undressed child at school for suspected child abuse gets QI
A state case worker who photographed a partially unclothed child at school gets qualified immunity for a special needs search of the child. No SCOTUS or circuit case says that the special needs doctrine does or does not apply here. … Continue reading
ABAJ: Law requiring Airbnb to turn over detailed data likely violates Fourth Amendment, judge says
ABAJ: Law requiring Airbnb to turn over detailed data likely violates Fourth Amendment, judge says by Debra Cassens Weiss:
W.D.Tex.: Def’s warrantless arrest in a casino by tribal officers was without PC; warrantless search of his car in parking lot suppressed
Tribal officers at a casino near El Paso watched on surveillance video defendant touch a rifle in his car but not pull it out when he was being harassed on the parking lot. They had reasonable suspicion to encounter him … Continue reading
D.Neb.: Google’s email search was a private search and NCMEC didn’t expand it
Google and NCMEC did not conduct Fourth Amendment searches when they encountered child pornography tied to his email account. They did private searches for their own purposes, and NCMEC did not expand Google’s private search. United States v. Ringland, 2019 … Continue reading
W.D.Pa.: Asst prosecutors at an investigation don’t get immunity for 4A violation they observed and allegedly condoned
Assistant prosecutors involved in an investigation do not get prosecutorial immunity for silence in the face of an alleged Fourth Amendment violation in their presence they allegedly condone. Fogle v. Pa. State Police, 2018 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 217701 (W.D. Pa. … Continue reading
NE: Smell of MJ from a car is PC to search it
Defendant’s driving alleged nearly caused an accident with a state trooper and another car, so he stopped it. The smell of marijuana was coming from the car, and that was probable cause for a search of the car. State v. … Continue reading
Gizmodo: Google Wins Lawsuit Over Face-Scanning Technology
Gizmodo: Google Wins Lawsuit Over Face-Scanning Technology by Lorraine Bailey:
CA11: Drug testing of substitute teacher applicants was reasonable
Drug testing of substitute teacher applicants was reasonable. School employment is different and protection of the environment of children is paramount. Friedenberg v. School Board of Palm Beach County, 2018 U.S. App. LEXIS 35905 (11th Cir. Dec. 20, 2018):
Fox News: Chinese schools enforce ‘smart uniforms’ with GPS tracking to surveil students
Life without a Fourth Amendment: Fox News: Chinese schools enforce ‘smart uniforms’ with GPS tracking to surveil students by Christopher Carbone: Ten schools in China have new “intelligent uniforms” that will track students’ whereabouts with embedded computer chips.
D.Nev.: CI’s alleged (and unsupported) false statement isn’t a Franks violation; has to be the affiant’s
Defendant claims a Franks violation because the CI is believed to be Rudnick, and Rudnick has credibility problems. Defendant doesn’t allege what is false to even get a hearing. Besides, Rudnick is the CI and not the affiant. Denied. United … Continue reading
D.Minn.: Border search of love letter in car led to more inquiries and then finding CP
A secondary search at the border can still be “routine” depending on its intensity. In this district, “routine” deals with searches of the person. Here, it was a search of a letter in the car that was a basically love … Continue reading
OH5: Separate federal SW against def didn’t warrant new trial; all too speculative
As defendant’s prosecution in this state case was proceeding to trial, a federal search warrant was also issued in a spinoff investigation. After conviction, a motion for new trial was filed based on alleged newly discovered evidence from the federal … Continue reading
D.S.C.: CI not sufficiently corroborated for PC for a vehicle search
Defendant was stopped for an alleged window tint violation, but the officer also relied on information from a CI from days before the stop that he thought was probable cause. The government had a dog sniff during the stop, but … Continue reading
W.D.Ky.: No showing of ownership for standing; wiretap talking about being able to give clear title wasn’t sufficient
Defendant has no standing in another person’s vehicle. He provided no affidavit of ownership, and he relies solely on a wiretap where he talked about it being his and he would provide clear title to it. “Standing is based on … Continue reading
Techdirt: County Pays $90,000 Settlement To Man After Seizing $80,000 Judgment From Him Using 24 Deputies And An Armored Vehicle
Techdirt: County Pays $90,000 Settlement To Man After Seizing $80,000 Judgment From Him Using 24 Deputies And An Armored Vehicle by Tim Cushing: When all you have is a war hammer, everything looks like a war. That’s how Wisconsin law … Continue reading
Treatise on sale through 1/2
Book (all Lexis books, apparently) on sale for 31% off through 1/2 midnight PT.
Techdirt.com: California Town OKs Destruction Of Police Shooting Records Days Before They Could Be Obtained By The Public
Techdirt.com: California Town OKs Destruction Of Police Shooting Records Days Before They Could Be Obtained By The Public by Tim Cushing: California has long protected police officers from accountability. Most police misconduct records are impossible to obtain via public records … Continue reading