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ABA Journal 's Blawg 100 (2015-2016)
by John Wesley Hall
Criminal Defense Lawyer and
Search and seizure law consultant
Little Rock, Arkansas
Contact / The Book
www.johnwesleyhall.com© 2003-17,
online since Feb. 24, 2003
WebPage Visits: real non-robot hits since 2010; approx. 20k posts since 2003~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Fourth Amendment cases,
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Stringrays (ACLU No. Cal.) (pdf)
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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Section 1983 Blog"If it was easy, everybody would be doing it. It isn't, and they don't."
—Me“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"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!”
"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."
---Pepé Le Pew
—Johnson v. United States, 333 U.S. 10, 13-14 (1948)
Category Archives: Probable cause
IN: A dog alert on a package wasn’t PC because it only proved the package could have been handled by somebody who might have used MJ legally
The state seized cash in a package for mailing for forfeiture and then sought to turn it over to the federal government. The owners sought to recover the cash. The court finds that the seizure of the cash was without … Continue reading
N.D.Ga.: It’s reasonable to infer that def’s shipping firearms to Trinidad would have records in residence and on computers and cell phones there
Defendant was suspected of shipping firearms to Trinidad from Atlanta. “The nature of the criminal conduct in which Defendant was engaged, purchasing firearms for the unlawful export to Trinidad and involving utilizing third parties to make the unlawful firearms purchases … Continue reading
DC Cir.: The mere fact a person has a cell phone isn’t PC to search it; must be PC evidence would be found
“Most of us nowadays carry a cell phone. And our phones frequently contain information chronicling our daily lives—where we go, whom we see, what we say to our friends, and the like. When a person is suspected of a crime, … Continue reading
CA4: Inevitable discovery applies to def’s name
The district court did not err in finding the inevitable discovery doctrine applied where officers responded to an assault call and saw defendant, believed to be a felon, with a gun. It was inevitable that police would have lawfully discovered … Continue reading
DE: Driving on wrong side of road, smell of alcohol, refusing breath test, failing FST adds up to PC
There was probable cause for taking defendant’s blood from driving on the wrong side of the highway, smelling of alcohol, refusing a breath test, and failing an FST. State v. Dopirak, 2017 Del. Super. LEXIS 358 (July 24, 2017). “Dearry … Continue reading
WaPo: 10th Circuit grants narrow victory to family raided by a SWAT team over loose leaf tea
WaPo: 10th Circuit grants narrow victory to family raided by a SWAT team over loose leaf tea by Radley Balko. The case is Harte v. Bd. of Commissioners, 2017 U.S. App. LEXIS 13399 (10th Cir. July 25, 2017), over a … Continue reading
D.Utah: Repeated flushing of toilet in a hotel room added to PC
“All of these facts, taken in their totality, support a finding of probable cause. There was a fair probability that the Defendant was present in room #209 based upon the informant’s tip indicating he was there, Defendant’s motorcycle found in … Continue reading
ProPublica: Houston Police End Use of Drug Tests That Helped Produce Wrongful Convictions
ProPublica: Houston Police End Use of Drug Tests That Helped Produce Wrongful Convictions by Ryan Gabrielson: The cheap kits were often the sole evidence used to win guilty pleas, against the innocent as well the as guilty.
CO: In this recreational MJ use state, a dog sniff is a “search,” and a positive alert isn’t PC a crime is occurring
Use of a drug dog on a car is a “search” in marijuana recreational use Colorado, and a dog alert which could be of either legal or illegal substances is not probable cause. People v. McKnight, 2017 COA 93, 2017 … Continue reading
