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- LA5: Drone video corroborates that car wasn’t searched before warrant arrived
- E.D.Tenn.: Frisk of bag was reasonable, too
- Reason: Other Courts Should Heed a Federal Judge’s Warning About Flock-Enabled Mass Surveillance
- Reason: Are Warrantless Phone Searches at the Border Constitutional? The Supreme Court May Soon Decide.
- S.D.W.Va.: Informant here conducted warrantless search for the government
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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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Stringrays (ACLU No. Cal.) (pdf)
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Congressional Research Service:
--Electronic Communications Privacy Act (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: Probable cause
CA8: Stop for warrant on driver made passenger’s stop reasonable
Defendant passenger’s detention was lawful when the car was stopped because of a warrant on the owner-driver. Being ordered into the car was also reasonable for officer safety. United States v. Negrete, 2026 U.S. App. LEXIS 30736 (8th Cir. Oct. … Continue reading
CA8: In a traffic stop, the passenger can be ordered to stay in the car or get out for officer safety
Defendant passenger’s detention was lawful when the car was stopped because of a warrant on the owner-driver. Being ordered into the car was also reasonable for officer safety. United States v. Negrete, 2026 U.S. App. LEXIS 30736 (8th Cir. Oct. … Continue reading
E.D.N.Y.: Investigation doesn’t have to be complete or perfect for there to be PC
There was no Franks violation, and there was probable cause. Yes, the officer could have done more to investigate, but that doesn’t mean that there wasn’t probable cause. United States v. Cruz, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 230292 (E.D.N.Y. Oct. 7, … Continue reading
S.D.N.Y.: Rule 41(g) petition for return of property granted; original seizure in NYC and Louisiana investigation hasn’t concluded
This is a Rule 41(g) petition for return of electronics seized by HSI in NYC on a Louisiana warrant for a Louisiana investigation, but no charges yet. HSI doesn’t support the basis for the seizure and hasn’t produced the warrant … Continue reading
S.D.Tex.: Govt can’t raise new 4A exception in motion to reconsider
While executing a search warrant, officers compelled defendant to provide the passcode to the safe. The court suppressed the contents of the safe because it was not a valid consent. The government doesn’t get to argue inevitable discovery on a … Continue reading
CA2: Car not named in SW could be seized and searched incident to forfeiture
The warrant here was for defendant’s house and grounds. No vehicles were mentioned even though officers had knowledge defendant dealt drugs at least from one. On executing the warrant, they found the vehicle and seized it for forfeiture. Searching it … Continue reading
E.D.Ky.: Possession of firearms is ongoing crime so seldom stale
Possession of firearms is an ongoing crime, not an episodic one, so the warrant was not stale. United States v. Jefferson, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 219784 (E.D. Ky. Sep. 28, 2026). The information in the affidavit for warrant was sufficient … Continue reading
D.Or.: “a person’s mere propinquity to others independently suspected of criminal activity does not, without more, give rise to probable cause to search that person.” Ybarra
There was no probable cause for defendant’s arrest just because he was around others there was probable cause for. United States v. Sentael, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 223598 (D. Or. Sep. 30, 2026)*:
E.D.Mich.: ER nurse’s finding shell casing in def’s pants was private search
Defendant was in the ER and the hospital had his clothes. A spent shell casing was discovered in his pants by a nurse and it was turned over to the police. That was a private search. United States v. Young, … Continue reading
CA11: Possession of firearm in high crime area not RS
Possession of a firearm in one’s pocket in an open carry state is not reasonable suspicion. Being in a high crime area adds nothing to that. United States v. Joseph, 2026 U.S. App. LEXIS 27723 (11th Cir. Sep. 9, 2026). … Continue reading
CA4: No REP in stolen car without showing it was obtained innocently
One has no reasonable expectation of privacy in a stolen vehicle, unless he can show he acquired it innocently. United States v. Starner, 2026 U.S. App. LEXIS 26653 (4th Cir. Aug. 31, 2026). In this soliciting minors for sex case, … Continue reading
GA: Facebook warrant was way overbroad and should have been suppressed, but harmless on whole record
The search warrant for defendant’s Facebook account was overbroad where it sought ten months of information where the alleged crime was only over a couple of days and covered “illegal activities.” Despite the illegal search, the conviction is affirmed because … Continue reading
D.Me.: Yes, more investigation could have been done, but there’s still PC on what there was
“With the benefit of advocacy and adversarial briefing, it is easy to look back over Special Agent Bell’s affidavit and reflect on the facts that are missing or additional investigative steps that could have been taken but were not. But … Continue reading
CA3: Brady doesn’t apply to SW materials
“Defendants also assert that the Government withheld impeaching information about Ferrante. Ferrante, however, did not testify at trial and only served as the affiant for a key search warrant. Brady does not entitle a defendant to disclosures of impeaching information … Continue reading
CA10: Def’s BO suggesting heroin abuse added to RS
The officer here detected defendant’s body odor as coming from heroin use, despite his lack of specific training. That was enough to order defendant out of the car and reasonable suspicion developed. United States v. Marshall, 2026 U.S. App. LEXIS … Continue reading
M.D.Fla.: Unidentified pills in driver’s lap may have been RS but it wasn’t PC for arrest
Defendant was stopped for speeding, and he was arrested for drugs based on unidentified pills found in his lap when the officer looked in. That might have been reasonable suspicion, but it wasn’t probable cause. Therefore, the arrest and car … Continue reading
D.C.Cir.: It was reasonable for officers to conclude that evidence or instrumentalities of the crime would be found in the car used in a robbery
It was reasonable for officers to conclude that evidence or instrumentalities of the crime would be found in the car used in a robbery. A mistaken description of the location of the car in the warrant was neither intentional nor … Continue reading
CA7: Officer’s warrantless view of CSAM flagged by hash value was not unreasonable
Google and others flagged apparent CSAM by hash value alone and reported them to NCMEC which forwarded them to police where the IP address was. The officer viewed the images without a warrant and found them with names suggesting they … Continue reading
CO: DNA could be seized from trash
Collecting defendant’s DNA from his trash out for collection didn’t violate the Fourth Amendment or the Colorado Constitution. People v. Anderson, 2026 COA 64 (Aug. 20, 2026) (2-1 on the state issue; a warrant should be required). Plaintiff’s claim that … Continue reading
GA: No IAC for not challenging complete cell phone download before search
Defense counsel wasn’t ineffective for not challenging a complete cell phone download as overbroad before the search because no binding case says it is. Lenon v. State, 2026 Ga. LEXIS 250 (Aug. 13, 2026). The question is not whether plaintiff … Continue reading