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Recent Posts
- CA4: Tracking order using cell site simulator with PC was reasonable
- CADC: When searching a cell phone and officers find it belonged to someone else, a new SW isn’t required; SWs are directed at things, places, and people and owner doesn’t matter for PC
- Seattle Times: US drug control agency will move to reclassify marijuana in a historic shift, AP sources
- D.N.M.: Even if def’s DNA was not obtained by consent, inevitable discovery applies
- E.D.Mo.: PV warrant permitted entry to place where def reasonably suspected to reside
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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 -
© 2003-24,
online since Feb. 24, 2003 Approx. 425,000 visits (non-robot) since 2012 Approx. 45,000 posts since 2003 (26,730+ on WordPress as of 12/31/23) -
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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)
--Outline of Federal Statutes Governing Wiretapping and Electronic Eavesdropping (2012)
--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)
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Category Archives: Social media warrants
N.D.Ga.: No nexus shown for Facebook SW, but GFE applied
The District Court disagrees with the USMJ that there was probable cause and nexus for a search warrant for defendant’s Facebook page. But, reasonable judges disagree, and that is enough for the court to conclude that the good faith exception … Continue reading
S.D.Ill.: Merely living in a house and being alleged to be a criminal doesn’t create nexus; more is required, and the govt had it here
It is settled in this circuit that merely because a person lives in a house doesn’t create a nexus to the house for crime; more is required. Here, the government gets over that hurdle. Defendant was overheard talking about having … Continue reading
E.D.Mo.: Def has no standing to challenge SW for another person’s Facebook account
Defendant was charged with drug dealing and the overdose death of A.C. He has no standing to challenge the search warrant for A.C.’s Facebook account. United States v. Brewer, 2018 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 220055 (E.D. Mo. Dec. 18, 2018). Despite … Continue reading
D.S.D.: SW affidavit attachments referred to in affidavit and were used at the pre-search briefing to narrow the search
The application for the search warrant could have been more clear, but it was still apparent that the attachments were incorporated, and they completed the probable cause showing. Moreover, the attachments were used in the pre-search briefing of the officers … Continue reading
D.Kan.: All SW needed to prove was that def had a Facebook account, but the police sought the entire contents of the account; suppressed as overbroad
Defendant doesn’t lose standing to contest a Facebook warrant because he’s a sex offender and the Facebook terms of service state that sex offenders can’t have accounts. He had an account, and he had standing. While this court has found … Continue reading
D.Conn.: Posting things to Facebook is a waiver of any REP, even in a “friends” setting
By posting to Facebook, even with a friends only setting, defendant waived his reasonable expectation of privacy in his postings. On the merits of the search warrant for Facebook, probable cause was shown. United States v. Westley, 2018 U.S. Dist. … Continue reading
E.D.N.Y.: Facebook warrants have to be broad; showing the crime under investigation is limit enough
If probable cause is shown, Facebook warrants have to be broad. There must be some attempt to limit by at least the crime under investigation, but the result will likely be production of the entire account. That is not unreasonable … Continue reading
Cal: Victim and witness’s public social media pages subject to subpoena by defense (with a history of the SCA)
Murder defendants sought private and public Facebook pages of the victim and state’s witnesses for their defense. The court of appeals quashed, and the court remands. The public pages shall be produced because they are public by consent. There’s a … Continue reading
W.D.Okla.: Facebook warrant for all content not overbroad; didn’t have to limit to communications and messages
The search warrant for defendant’s Facebook was not overbroad, and it didn’t have to be limited to communications and messages. It could be for the entirety of the account for the relevant period. United States v. Varnell, 2018 U.S. Dist. … Continue reading