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- VA: Body cam video of valid arrest would not be suppressed
- NM: Trial court’s finding of consent is reversed because the court engaged in its own internet investigation beyond what the parties provided
- Reason: No Warrant, No Suspicion, No Problem: Flock and Border Cellphone Searches Excluded From 4th Amendment Rules
- Reason: Flock’s Gunfire Alerts Raise a New Fourth Amendment Question
- N.D.Ohio: Car in driveway was on curtilage and plain view prohibited
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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)
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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. 
Category Archives: Exclusionary rule
CA9: Not clearly established that County of Riverside violation warrants suppression
It was not clearly established that a County of Riverside violation of allegedly delaying a probable cause determination to gather more evidence was subject to suppression. Even Riverside doesn’t say that it is. Thus, the district court’s determination counsel wasn’t … Continue reading
D.N.M.: Vehicle already searched under the automobile exception can be searched again at police station
A vehicle already searched under the automobile exception can be searched again after it is removed to the police lot. United States v. Mazon, 2020 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 64813 (D. N.M. Apr. 13, 2020). The Texas trial court didn’t err … Continue reading
E.D.Tex.: Searching a car more than once isn’t a 4A violation
“The fact that Detective Nance searched portions of the vehicle more than once did not violate the Fourth Amendment.” Mendoza v. United States, 2020 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 68469 (E.D. Tex. Apr. 20, 2020). The exclusionary rule does not apply in … Continue reading
D.Ariz.: Overseizure of emails by SW didn’t require suppression of all; GFE also applies
This search warrant was issued in a SSA fraud case alleging a decade of false claims. The search warrant was sufficiently particular and not overbroad. The fact the period of the alleged offense was through January 2014 did not prohibit … Continue reading
AZ: Successfully controverting PC for SW requires return of copies of digital evidence
Defendant in a criminal case was suspected of Arizona wildlife offenses, and the state procured a search warrant. He successful controverted the warrant for lack of probable cause under state statute. Digital copies of evidence were kept by the state. … Continue reading
CA2: Even assuming this supervised release search lacked RS, there were facts supporting it and the exclusionary rule will not be applied
Even if the supervised release search here was without reasonable suspicion, the purposes of the exclusionary rule aren’t served. “Even assuming [Officer] Dyckman acted unreasonably in failing to conduct further investigation before executing the search, this is not the kind … Continue reading
D.P.R.: Search of room six hours before SW issued (not to mention lies about it) leads to suppression
The search of defendant’s room was six hours before the search warrant was issued. It was an investigative search and not a protective sweep. The officer admitted that he was looking for something to put in the affidavit for the … Continue reading
S.D.Cal.: USMC spotter working with CBP didn’t violate Posse Comitatus Act
A US Marine working the border spotted a potential illegal crossing through a scope and reported it to the Border Patrol who made the stop and arrest. The Posse Comitatus Act as interpreted by the Ninth Circuit applies to the … Continue reading
ME: Statute requiring blood draw in fatal accident without PC violates 4A; but GFE applied here
Maine’s statute that requires a blood draw of the driver in a fatal or near fatal accident without probable cause violates the Fourth Amendment. Thus, the 2007 case upholding the statute is overruled. It cannot be categorized under the special … Continue reading
D.Me.: State bail condition that def submit to searches permitted this search
Defendant’s state court bail condition included that he submit to reasonable searches of his person and place at anytime. There’s no showing that he didn’t understand the condition. United States v. Kissh, 2020 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 3767 (D. Me. Jan. … Continue reading
D.Neb.: Handcuffing on RS to assure safety and maintain the status quo reasonable and not a de facto arrest
Handcuffing a person on reasonable suspicion just to protect the officer’s safety and maintain the status quo is not unreasonable. United States v. Mayfield, 2020 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 520 (D. Neb. Jan. 3, 2020). While the exclusionary rule can apply … Continue reading
CA1: Routine booking fingerprints even in an unlawful arrest not subject to exclusionary rule and are reasonable
Routine taking of booking fingerprints held not unreasonable, even if the arrest turned out to be unlawful. The district court held that they were admissible by inevitable discovery because the officers would have found that defendant was here unlawfully. The … Continue reading
MO: Exclusionary rule inapplicable in civil and administrative proceedings
The exclusionary rule does not apply in civil or administrative proceedings. Mo. Landowners Alliance v. Pub. Serv. Comm’n, 2019 Mo. App. LEXIS 1975 (Dec. 17, 2019). There was reasonable suspicion to conduct a weapons search of defendant’s vehicle. The stop … Continue reading
Cal.: Privately recorded conversation in violation of state law admissible in a criminal case under 1982’s Proposition 8
A private party recorded a telephone call with defendant admitting a criminal sex act. Proposition 8 on “Truth in Evidence” adopted by voters in 1982 made the exclusionary rule follow the Fourth Amendment exclusionary rule. The legislature amended it by … Continue reading
DC: Telling def to put his hands on the wall for a patdown was a seizure and wasn’t consensual
Telling defendant to put his hands against the wall and assume the position for a patdown was a seizure, and here it was without probable cause. It was not consensual. Dozier v. United States, 2019 D.C. App. LEXIS 495 (Dec. … Continue reading
W.D.N.C.: Guilty plea waived 4A IAC claim
“The knowing and voluntary guilty plea waived all alleged ineffective assistance of counsel which preceded it, including counsel’s alleged deficiencies with regards to Fourth Amendment issues.” Allen v. United States, 2019 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 205762 (W.D. N.C. Nov. 26, 2019). … Continue reading
WV: Exclusionary rule does not apply in civil cases
DHHR obtained information about the parents from an alleged illegal stop. The exclusionary rule doesn’t apply in civil cases. In re N.R., 2019 W. Va. LEXIS 524 (Nov. 7, 2019). A game warden approached plaintiff sitting in his truck in … Continue reading
N.D.Cal.: Search of car violated Rodriguez and product of that search led to suppression of SW for house
Defendant’s stop was unreasonably prolonged and violated Rodriguez. The product of that search was used to get a search warrant for the house. The search of the house is suppressed, too. United States v. Maffei, 2019 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 177755 … Continue reading