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- USA Today: Cell phone SW for cause of crash
- Treatise on sale to 11/1
- MD: While protective sweep information made it into SW affidavit, there was PC without it
- N.D.Ga.: A Customs forensic search of a cell phone away from the border was still a border search
- CA6: State officer’s arrest for violation of federal MJ law likely wouldn’t violate 4A
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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)
--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)
--Federal Laws Relating to Cybersecurity: Discussion of Proposed Revisions (2012)
ACLU on privacy
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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: Standing
OH2: Def’s denial of possessory interest in car at suppression hearing denies him standing
“During the suppression hearing, Williamson specifically disclaimed a possessory interest in the Chrysler 300” so he didn’t have standing. State v. Williamson, 2017-Ohio-7098, 2017 Ohio App. LEXIS 3217 (2d Dist. Aug. 4, 2017). (Shades of Rawlings v. Kentucky where the … Continue reading
NY1: Staying “on and off” with an uncle for many years, getting mail there, storing all his clothes there gave standing
The trial court erred in finding that defendant lacked standing to challenge the propriety of the search of the apartment because defendant’s uncle, who resided in the apartment, told the police that defendant had stayed with his family “on and … Continue reading
N.D.Ga. predicts CA11 would go with totality standard in standing in a borrowed rented car
Noting the different approaches of the circuits to the standing of a driver of a rental car who is not on the contract but operating with permission of the renter, the totality of circumstances test is adopted, and he lacks … Continue reading
S.D.N.Y.: Seizure of months of CSLI was proper to connect def to a particular place
Months of historical CSLI, rather than just three day’s worth, was properly acquired by the government to show defendant’s connections to the property at issue. The third party doctrine provides defendant no relief [yet]. United States v. Serrano, 2017 U.S. … Continue reading
PA: Unreasonable stop voids subsequent search even for a passenger otherwise without standing
The initial illegality of an unreasonable stop taints the following search whether the defendant has standing in the car or not. Commonwealth v. Shabezz, 2017 Pa. LEXIS 1691 (July 19, 2017):
CT: Def didn’t satisfy guest standing, and co-conspirator standing rejected
Defendant lacked standing to challenge the search of a grow operation because it wasn’t his place. The fact there were a couple of pieces of mail and one piece of personal property at the place, without more, didn’t show how … Continue reading
D.Vt.: Payton doesn’t require an arrest warrant come with a SW
Payton does not require that an arrest warrant also be obtained to arrest a suspect during the execution of a search warrant on his premises. Defendant was lawfully arrested in the house when the search warrant was executed. United States … Continue reading
LA: “Defendant thus was in the difficult position of having to both distance himself from the barbeque grill, if he hoped to be found not guilty of possession of the cocaine found inside it, and tie himself more closely to the grill, if he hoped to obtain a favorable ruling on the motion to suppress. Trying to do both, he succeeded at neither.”
Showing a reasonable expectation of privacy in the place searched but denying possession is a fine line indeed. Show too much of an expectation of privacy just to challenge the search [always a risky proposition] and you might put yourself … Continue reading
CA9: Intervenors show no standing to challenge admin. SDT to Oregon Prescription Drug Monitoring Program
Intervenors showed no Art. III standing to challenge the DEA’s administrative subpoenas to the Oregon Prescription Drug Monitoring Program. Art. III standing requires that they show independent standing to sue. Oregon Prescription Drug Monitoring Program v. United States Drug Enforcement … Continue reading
GA: No standing in phone subscriber records to a phone that’s not in his name
Defendant consented to giving his phone to the police. During his interview, he picked up the phone and was manipulating it, and the officers took it away from him until they could get a search warrant. This was reasonable [and … Continue reading
D.P.R.: Secondary border inspection of def’s cell phone for evidence of dog fighting was reasonable
Defendant’s alleged fighting dogs and his cell phone were validly the subject of secondary border inspections in San Juan. United States v. Castro-Correa, 2017 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 90966 (D.P.R. June 12, 2017).* Defendant didn’t have standing to challenge the search … Continue reading
PA: Having hotel room key without anyone being registered in room doesn’t show standing
Defendant in speaking to the police said that he was staying in 111 of the Knights Inn hotel, and he showed a key card. When the officer turned away the key was hidden in the car. Later the police retrieved … Continue reading
D.N.M.: Where search of backpacks in car was unreasonable, each def only had standing as to his own bag
Defendants were involved in a rollover accident on a New Mexico interstate highway. Another person came to pick them up after they called. The officer on the scene insisted on searching each of the bags that they pulled out of … Continue reading
OH6: Merely being “associated” with a vehicle doesn’t confer standing
“In his motion to suppress, he asserted only that he was ‘associated’ with the truck. We find an ‘association’ with the vehicle gives no greater rights than a mere passenger. Therefore, we agree with the state that appellant could not … Continue reading
CA4: Wikimedia can show standing to challenge internet surveillance under Clapper v. Amesty International
Wikimedia’s complaint against the NSA survives SCOTUS Clapper v. Amnesty International standing analysis. Wikimedia handles over one trillion internet communications a year, and every internet portal in the U.S. and likely the world reaches it. Therefore, some communications have to … Continue reading
TN: Def’s disclaimer of interest in apartment he was in denied him standing
The trial court credited the officer’s testimony that defendant said that he could not consent to a search of the apartment he was in because it wasn’t his residence. That meant he lacked standing. The police came there expecting it … Continue reading
OH5: Def without DL and not on rental agreement as authorized driver had no standing
Defendant never had a DL, and he was driving a rental car and wasn’t on the paperwork as an authorized driver, so the renter had no authority to let him drive. Therefore, he lacked standing. State v. Nicholson, 2017-Ohio-2825, 2017 … Continue reading
E.D.Mich.: Affidavit for SW and other things showed def’s standing in two cell phones
The search warrant affidavit showed defendant’s standing in two cell phones that were seized. The phones were referred to as belonging to defendant, and she claimed them when asked about them but disclaimed ownership in others. Finally, she proffered that … Continue reading
CA2: Unlicensed driver of rental car rented by another had no standing in car
The court does not have to decide whether the unauthorized driver of a rental car as to the rental contract has standing, despite being loaned the car by the renter, noting differing authorities; because defendant was also an unlicensed driver … Continue reading
C.D.Ill.: Long term borrower of car has standing
One who borrows a car for a long time has standing. “And the Court is persuaded that society is prepared to accept as reasonable a person’s subjective expectation of privacy in a car borrowed for months on end from a … Continue reading