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Recent Posts
- E.D.Tenn.: Application for SW was considered in detention ruling
- TN: RS didn’t develop to continue stop; second stop based on first suppressed
- CA4: Traffic stop immediately became firearms investigation; suppressed
- CA10: Disagreement over spelling of street name didn’t make warrant fail particularity; GFE at least would apply
- VA: Statutory requirement to provide SW papers only applies to “places of abode”
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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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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)
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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, 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: Issue preclusion
MS: Failure to include SW materials anywhere in record was waiver of issues about it
Failure to include the search warrant materials anywhere in the record, either as an attachment to the motion or an exhibit at a hearing, is waiver for appeal on whether the warrant was properly issued. Burdine v. State, 2026 Miss. … Continue reading
CA6: 3 days between controlled buy and SW execution not stale
This search warrant didn’t go stale in the three days between the controlled buy and its execution. United States v. Lawrence, 2026 U.S. App. LEXIS 9780 (6th Cir. Apr. 3, 2026).* The BAC blood draw statute includes drawing and testing, … Continue reading
CA8: Password note near domestic partner’s computer was RS def on probation used that computer, too
Passwords near a computer seen in a probation search around defendant’s domestic partner’s computer was reasonable suspicion defendant could have too. United States v. Berry, 24-2337 (8th Cir. April 3, 2026).* Mandamus doesn’t lie to remedy petitioner’s constitutional claims. He … Continue reading
OH9: Arrest warrant for a co-occupant of the house permitted entry under Payton
Officers had an arrest warrant for a co-occupant of the house, and that permitted their entry under Payton. State v. Cecil, 2026-Ohio-1100 (9th Dist. Mar. 30, 2026). The record on who actually consented or had apparent authority is incomplete, and … Continue reading
ID: POs may do protective sweeps of a house same any other officer
“Having considered the rationale justifying protective sweeps, we hold, as a matter of first impression, that probation officers conducting lawful compliance checks in a residence may conduct a protective sweep to the same extent and are subject to the same … Continue reading
E.D.La.: RS def was armed in a NOLA firearms free zone
The officer had reasonable suspicion defendant was armed, but also in a firearm-free zone during Mardi Gras which was reasonably determined. United States v. Bryant, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 62869 (E.D. La. Mar. 25, 2026).* 2255 petitioner’s guilty plea waived … Continue reading
CA9: 48-hour delay in getting a warrant for a mailed package wasn’t unreasonable
A 48 hour delay in getting a warrant for a mailed package wasn’t unreasonable. United States v. Garza, 2026 U.S. App. LEXIS 8714 (9th Cir. Mar. 25, 2026). Petitioner’s bank records were obtained by search warrant. They are third party … Continue reading
RI: Trial stipulation DNA on blanket was def’s obviates search claim
Defendant wasn’t prejudiced by defense counsel not moving to suppress DNA off a blanket found on a road when he’d stipulated to it being his DNA. [There’s also an obvious abandonment issue not even mentioned.] Tassone v. State, 2026 R.I. … Continue reading
DC: Officer’s unreasonable mistake of law did not make the stop reasonable under Heien
The officer’s unreasonable mistake of law on windshield tint (“can’t have tint at all” v. it can have some) did not make the stop reasonable under Heien. Griffin v. United States, 2026 D.C. App. LEXIS 95 (Mar. 19, 2026). Defendant’s … Continue reading
D.N.H.: Private entrance to third-floor apartment’s curtilage is the hallway leading to it
Plaintiff lived in a third-floor apartment in a building where only he had a key and access, and that was his curtilage. (Apparently the door was unlocked when this entry occurred.) The individual official entered without knocking and getting permission … Continue reading
DE: Second warrant after first general warrant was independent source for search
The trial court held the warrant for defendant’s cell phone was a general warrant for overbreadth but the independent source doctrine saved the second search warrant after the first search. “All Delaware Superior Court cases addressing the instant issue support … Continue reading
CA8: Police with arrest warrant could enter third-party premises to arrest defendant
Police with a warrant for defendant could enter a third party’s premises to arrest him on probable cause that he was present. Under Steagald, defendant had no more reasonable expectation of privacy in the third party’s premises than the owner … Continue reading
D.Ariz.: Alleged perjury at state suppression hearing doesn’t overcome Stone bar
2254 petitioner’s claim the officer perjured himself during his suppression hearing doesn’t overcome the Stone bar. Soliven v. Thornell, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 45209 (D. Ariz. Mar. 5, 2026). 2254 petitioner’s effort to include an “inadvertently omitted” Fourth Amendment claim … Continue reading
S.D.Ohio: Two on Stone
“Because Stone v. Powell prohibits this Court’s consideration of Petitioner’s Fourth Amendment claim, the Magistrate Judge’s denial of expansion of the record to include the dash cam footage is affirmed because consideration of that footage is prohibited by Stone. The … Continue reading
W.D.Pa.: Younger doctrine didn’t apply when plaintiff’s criminal case was over
Younger doctrine didn’t apply when plaintiff’s criminal case was over. Harris v. Trent, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 42416 (W.D. Pa. Mar. 2, 2026). “Here, assuming the factual disputes in Franke’s favor, the relevant question is whether it was clearly established … Continue reading
D.N.M.: Suit over search in pending criminal case barred by Heck
Plaintiff’s first Fourth Amendment claim failed under Heck. He amended the complaint and still doesn’t overcome it. His claim of failure to train in serving search warrants is conclusory and doesn’t state a claim either. Flores v. Wood, 2026 U.S. … Continue reading