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- Gizmodo: How You Could End Up in a Government Surveillance Database and Never Know It
- Reason: Miami Sheriff Hired a Private Law Firm To Pursue—and Profit From—Asset Forfeiture Cases
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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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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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"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
IL: A dog sniff on the third floor apartment doors of an unlocked building violated Jardines
A dog sniff on the third floor apartment doors of an unlocked building violated Jardines. The sniff occurred two years after Jardines. People v. Bonilla, 2017 IL App (3d) 160457, 2017 Ill. App. LEXIS 380 (June 14, 2017):
WI: Are “open fields” on private property “public places” for officers committing a trespass?
WI holds that defendant as entitled to a self-defense instruction when he encountered two game officers on his property and thought they were trespassers. The concurring opinion concentrates on the intrusion into “open fields” and whether the state can treat … Continue reading
Hudson gutted the knock-and-announce rule by making it purely optional 11 years ago today
Hudson v. Michigan, 547 U.S. 586 (2006), decided 11 years ago today, unraveling the knock-and-announce rule of Wilson v. Arkansas (1995) and Richards v. Wisconsin (1997). It’s constitutionally required, it saves lives, it’s far more civil in a civil society, … Continue reading
IL: Officer reaching into vestibule of home violated curtilage
The officer’s reaching into the vestibule of a two-unit apartment building intruded into an area with a reasonable expectation of privacy under Jardines. The building was essentially a one family dwelling. People v. Martin, 2017 IL App (1st) 143255, 2017 … Continue reading
The Hill: Opinion: Mass surveillance reform is one issue where Republicans and Democrats can work together
The Hill: Opinion: Mass surveillance reform is one issue where Republicans and Democrats can work together by Neema Singh Guliani and Jesse Blumenthal: The government has a responsibility to help keep Americans safe, but in the process it must also … Continue reading
CT: Slight difference between description and actual dress didn’t undermine RS
Defendant’s request to stop by the police based on his description and clothing was still justified despite the slight disagreement between what he was wearing and the description. Reasonable suspicion developed and defendant’s pat down was justified. State v. Lewis, … Continue reading
PA: Having hotel room key without anyone being registered in room doesn’t show standing
Defendant in speaking to the police said that he was staying in 111 of the Knights Inn hotel, and he showed a key card. When the officer turned away the key was hidden in the car. Later the police retrieved … Continue reading
PA: Deciding a motion to suppress on grounds not raised by the defense was an abuse of discretion; state didn’t get to respond
Deciding a motion to suppress on grounds not raised by the defense was an abuse of discretion because the state did not get to raise a defense to it. Commonwealth v. Banks, 2017 PA Super 182, 2017 Pa. Super. LEXIS … Continue reading
NYTimes: ‘How Far Can They Go?’ Police Search of Hundreds of Students Stokes Lawsuit and Constitutional Questions
NYTimes: ‘How Far Can They Go?’ Police Search of Hundreds of Students Stokes Lawsuit and Constitutional Questions by Jacey Fortin: Worth County High School was buzzing with late-year activities on April 14. Seniors had recently taken their group photo for … Continue reading
NY4: Probation condition that def consent to searches reasonably related to his crime and rehabilitation
Defendant’s probation condition that he consent to searches is reasonably related to his crime and rehabilitation. People v. King, 2017 NY Slip Op 04618, 2017 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 4686 (4th Dept. June 9, 2017).* “Giving due weight to each … Continue reading
CA9: Second coordinated traffic stop after first was prolonged in violation of Rodriguez was “fruit of the poisonous tree”; cash for forfeiture suppressed
“We hold that the search of Gorman’s vehicle following the coordinated traffic stops violated the Constitution and affirm the district court’s order granting Gorman’s motion to suppress. Gorman’s first roadside detention was unreasonably prolonged in violation of the Fourth Amendment. … Continue reading
KS: State’s failure to prove the inventory policy was fatal to the inventory search
State’s failure to prove the inventory policy was fatal to the inventory search. State v. Baker, 2017 Kan. LEXIS 310 (June 9, 2017):
W.D.Ky.: SW for premises permits search of any vehicle parked on the property
The search warrant for the house in this case permitted a search of any vehicles on the premises, not just those belonging to the owner of the residence. In any event, the good faith exception applies. United States v. Keeling, … Continue reading
M.D.Pa.: Def’s matching citizen informant’s description and location was RS, and his flight was PC
The detailed description given by a 911 calling citizen informant was reasonable suspicion when defendant was seen matching the description. When police approached him, defendant ran, and that was probable cause. United States v. King, 2017 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 88514 … Continue reading
D.Ariz.: Lifting the tarp off a parked car was reasonable as a protective sweep
Lifting the tarp off a parked car was reasonable as a protective sweep. The officer did not search the car – he only looked in it to make sure no one was hiding there. Defendant’s wife permitted entry into the … Continue reading
AP: Exclusive: Moonlighting police leave body cameras behind
AP: Exclusive: Moonlighting police leave body cameras behind by John Seww:er That’s because most police agencies that make the cameras mandatory for patrol shifts don’t require or won’t allow body cameras for off-duty officers even if they’re working in uniform, … Continue reading
Chicago Reporter: Police misconduct payouts continue to break the bank in Chicago
Chicago Reporter: Police misconduct payouts continue to break the bank in Chicago by Jonah Newman: In its final report last April, the task force criticized the city’s police oversight bodies for failing to analyze these lawsuits for trends or patterns, … Continue reading