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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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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 -
Latest Slip Opinions:
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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)
ACLU on privacy
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NACDL’s Domestic Drone Information Center
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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. 
Category Archives: Uncategorized
MSNBC: Opinion: A hospitalized baby, a terrified mother: A botched police raid in Ohio is the tip of the iceberg
MSNBC: Opinion: A hospitalized baby, a terrified mother: A botched police raid in Ohio is the tip of the iceberg by Radley Balko (“Until judges start taking seriously their responsibility to protect the Fourth Amendment, expect to see more innocent … Continue reading
CA6: Arrest on a PV warrant permits search incident
A parole violation warrant permits a search incident to the arrest. United States v. Henderson, 2024 U.S. App. LEXIS 362 (6th Cir. Jan. 4, 2024) (applying Michigan law) (and after all, the defendant’s going to jail). Stopping with the front … Continue reading
“We are rapidly entering the age of no privacy, where everyone is open to surveillance at all times; where there are no secrets from government. The aggressive breaches of privacy by the Government increase by geometric proportions.”
Osborn v. United States, 385 U.S. 323, 87 S.Ct. 429, 439, 17 L.Ed.2d 394) (1966) (Douglas dissenting), Hoffa v. United States, 385 U.S. 293, 87 S.Ct. 408, 17 L.Ed.2d 374 (1966) (concurring in part with Clark), Lewis v. United States, … Continue reading
ProPublica: Body Cameras Were Sold as a Tool of Police Reform. Ten Years Later, Most of the Footage Is Kept From Public View.
ProPublica: Body Cameras Were Sold as a Tool of Police Reform. Ten Years Later, Most of the Footage Is Kept From Public View. by Umar Farooq (“There were 101 people killed at the hands of police in June 2022. More … Continue reading
Today is Bill of Rights Day
December 15, 1791
WaPo: Pharmacies share medical data with police without a warrant, inquiry finds
WaPo: Pharmacies share medical data with police without a warrant, inquiry finds by Drew Harwell (“The revelation could shape the debate over Americans’ health privacy as states move to criminalize abortion and drugs related to reproductive health.”)
Reason: DEA’s Domestic Surveillance ‘Mission Creep’
Reason: DEA’s Domestic Surveillance ‘Mission Creep’ by Patrick Eddington (“It appears that DEA agents have been employed on non-drug-related investigations for far longer than they were originally authorized.”)
Another AI pleading with made up caselaw
Pranshu Verma and Will Oremus, These lawyers used ChatGPT to save time. They got fired and fined. (Wash. Post Nov. 16, 2023) (“Artificial intelligence is changing how law is practiced, but not always for the better”). That’s the lead but … Continue reading
D.Minn.: Failure to show nexus still saved by GFE because there’s always an inference
The affidavit for warrant here completely failed to link defendant’s residence to drugs. One fact was that he left there, met up with a confederate, and went to a drug deal. That wasn’t enough. Still, the good faith exception saves … Continue reading
“Breaking Bad” ended a decade ago today
Last of 62 episodes September 29, 2013.
N.D.Ohio: Erroneous DL suspension record still led to a valid search
An erroneous DL suspension record still led to a valid search. (Evans; Herring) United States v. Boxx, 2023 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 172377 (N.D. Ohio Sep. 27, 2023). Appellant’s request that the court of appeals reject Franks and state supreme court … Continue reading
IL: Frisk unjustified without showing risk def was armed
Defendant’s frisk was unjustified. There was no reasonable suspicion he was armed. People v. Lozano, 2023 Ill. LEXIS 463 (Sep. 21, 2023).* Defendant used his cell phone to arrange drug deals, and a search warrant was sought for the phone. … Continue reading
NYT: The Man Who Trapped Us in Databases
NYT: The Man Who Trapped Us in Databases by McKenzie Funk Hank Asher was a drug smuggler with a head for numbers — until he figured out how to turn Americans’ private information into a big business.
Just Security: Resolving Carpenter’s Third-Party Paradox (Part II – The Solution)
Just Security: Resolving Carpenter’s Third-Party Paradox (Part II – The Solution) by Michael Dreeben, Elizabeth N. Hadley, Conor S. O’Shea and Johanna Seale:
D.Neb.: Failure to mention lack of ShotSpotter alert in SW affidavit after seeing possible evidence inside SUV not material
Police responding to a shots fired call looked through the windows of defendant’s Tahoe and saw a gun magazine. Failure to mention the lack of a ShotSpotter alert wasn’t material. United States v. Johnson, 2023 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 164666 (D. … Continue reading
Today is Constitution Day
Bill of Rights Day is December 15th
Reason: How Hippies Saved the Fourth Amendment
Reason: How Hippies Saved the Fourth Amendment by Sean Howe (“The Nixon administration did everything it could to curb antiwar activism. Then the courts said it had gone too far.”)
CA6: Unreasonable delay for vehicle forfeiture decision violates due process
“We … hold that Wayne County violated that Constitution when it seized plaintiffs’ personal vehicles—which were vital to their transportation and livelihoods—with no timely process to contest the seizure. We further hold that Wayne County was required to provide an … Continue reading
techdirt: Kansas State Police Tell Court It’s Too Much To Ask For Troopers To Respect The Constitution
techdirt: Kansas State Police Tell Court It’s Too Much To Ask For Troopers To Respect The Constitution by Tim Cushing:
Law license 50 today
Today is my 50th anniversary as a lawyer, sworn in at 9:00 am, Friday August 31, 1973, by Jimmy Hawkins, the Clerk of the Arkansas Supreme Court. (The bar results were out at noon Saturday, August 25th. I don’t remember … Continue reading