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- IN: Cell phone ping to locate missing 13-year-old was with exigent circumstances
- NY4: Def proved IAC for failure to move to suppress cell phone search
- TN: Ptf’s actions at DV call justified officers’ greater force
- KS: Def voluntarily disclosed his cell phone passcode to the officers when the officer said he’d get a warrant
- ID: State completely failed to support justification for inventory
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ABA Journal Web 100, Best Law Blogs (2017); ABA Journal Blawg 100 (2015-16) (discontinued 2018)
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by John Wesley Hall
Criminal Defense Lawyer and
Search and seizure law consultant
Little Rock, Arkansas
Contact: forhall @ aol.com / The Book
www.johnwesleyhall.com -
© 2003-25,
online since Feb. 24, 2003 Approx. 500,000 visits (non-robot) since 2012 Approx. 47,000 posts since 2003 (30,000+ on WordPress as of 12/31/24) -
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Fourth Amendment cases,
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Congressional Research Service:
--Electronic Communications Privacy Act (2012)
--Overview of the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (2012)
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--Federal Statutes Governing Wiretapping and Electronic Eavesdropping (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) -
“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 -
"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] -
“You know, most men would get discouraged by now. Fortunately for you, I am not most men!”
---Pepé Le Pew "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)
Website design by Wally Waller, Little Rock
Category Archives: Uncategorized
LATimes: ‘Ghost stops’: Lieutenant claims LAPD officials were warned about troubled gang unit
LATimes: ‘Ghost stops’: Lieutenant claims LAPD officials were warned about troubled gang unit by Libor Jany (claim of retaliation for reporting on police stops where body cams were turned off or no reports ever made).
To ChatGPT: Why should lawyers not trust AI for briefs?
Lawyers may have concerns about relying on AI for legal briefs due to several reasons. While AI can be a powerful tool for legal research and drafting, there are potential pitfalls that can make it risky to trust AI entirely … Continue reading
The Marshall Project: How a 1963 Cleveland Case Shaped Stop-and-Frisk Police Tactics, and Why It Still Matters
The Marshall Project: How a 1963 Cleveland Case Shaped Stop-and-Frisk Police Tactics, and Why It Still Matters by Brittany Hailer and Rachel Dissell, data analysis by Doug Livingston. In § 21.04 of the Treatise there’s a discussion of the history … Continue reading
Today is Bill of Rights Day
Fourth Amendment, established December 15, 1791.
Reason: Kindle Version of “The Digital Fourth Amendment” Is Now Available
Reason: Kindle Version of “The Digital Fourth Amendment” Is Now Available by Orin S. Kerr (“You have to wait until January for the physical book, but you can read the electronic version now. … I’m very pleased to say that … Continue reading
Forbes: FinCEN Says Corporate Transparency Act (CTA) Reports Are Voluntary Following Court Decision
Forbes: FinCEN Says Corporate Transparency Act (CTA) Reports Are Voluntary Following Court Decision. My post on the case here
For originalists, is using the military to conduct arrests and detentions in the U.S. a “reasonable search and seizure”?
Reuters: Republican Rand Paul opposes Trump talk of using military in deportations by Bo Erickson (“A 19th century U.S. law prohibits federal troops from being used in domestic law enforcement except when authorized by Congress. [¶] Paul, at times a … Continue reading
D.Ariz.: An inventory at the scene and not at the police station is still valid
The fact an otherwise valid inventory of defendant’s satchel happened in the field and not at the police station doesn’t make it unreasonable. United States v. Soto, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 202833 (D. Ariz. Nov. 7, 2024). Small talk between … Continue reading
Podcast: Fourth Amendment Protections in a Connected World
Digital Boundaries: Fourth Amendment Protections in a Connected World — The Presumption of Innocence (Podcast) (“Modern technology is testing the limits of the Fourth Amendment and redefining the parameters of privacy. Michael Price, Litigation Director of the Fourth Amendment Center … Continue reading
Law Review: The Automated Fourth Amendment
Maneka Sinha, The Automated Fourth Amendment, 73 Emory L. J. 589 (2024). The abstract:
NACDL CLE: Artificial Justice: AI, Tech and Criminal Defense (Oct. 7-8)
NACDL CLE: Artificial Justice: AI, Tech and Criminal Defense, Georgetown University Law Center, Washington, DC, October 7-8 from NACDL’s Fourth Amendment Center and Georgetown. The materials were distributed yesterday, and it will be excellent.
SCOTUS grants cert in excessive force case
Barnes v. Felix, 23-1239 (granted Oct. 4, 2024):
Reason: A Houston Drug Cop’s Murder Conviction Highlights the Potentially Deadly Consequences of ‘Testifying’
Reason: A Houston Drug Cop’s Murder Conviction Highlights the Potentially Deadly Consequences of ‘Testifying’ by Jacob Sullum (“It is hard to say how often this sort of thing happens, since prosecutors, judges, and jurors tend to discount the protestations of … Continue reading
Book Review of Unreasonable: Constitutionalizing Racism
Book Review: Jonathan P. Feingold, Constitutionalizing Racism, 104 B.U. L. Rev. Online 1 (2024):
Yes, I’m behind on postings
I’m in my ninth trial this year. Tenth next week.
AP: Prosecutors plan to charge former Kansas police chief over his conduct following newspaper raid
AP: Prosecutors plan to charge former Kansas police chief over his conduct following newspaper raid by John Hanna (“Two special prosecutors said Monday that they plan to charge a former central Kansas police chief with obstruction of justice over his … Continue reading
WaPo: House privacy talks implode in spectacular fashion
WaPo: House privacy talks implode in spectacular fashion, Analysis by Cristiano Lima-Strong (“For years, attempts by Congress to rein in Silicon Valley have largely fizzled out with a whimper. But on Thursday, House efforts to pass a long-sought national privacy … Continue reading
MD: New statute that smell of cannabis isn’t PC isn’t retroactive
The statute saying that the smell of cannabis in a car is no longer probable cause isn’t retroactive, and a search that occurred before its effective date is not subject to the exclusionary rule. Kelly v. State, 2024 Md. App. … Continue reading
D.Minn.: Calling in wrong LPN made stop unreasonable
Defendant’s stop based on a mistaken belief the vehicle was stolen was not objectively reasonable when it was based on calling in the wrong number. United States v. Fields, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 99668 (D. Minn. June 5, 2024), rejecting … Continue reading
N.D.Okla.: Cell phones possessed by tribal police not subject to return under Rule 41(g)
Motion for return of cell phones is denied. They are in the possession of the Muskogee Creek Nation tribal police, not the federal government. United States v. Smith, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 87341 (N.D. Okla. May 15, 2024). Motion for … Continue reading