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- CA6: Electronic devices were “property under his control” subject to search while on supervised release
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- E.D.Cal.: Failure to provide medical care to an arrestee can be a 4A issue
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ABA Journal Web 100, Best Law Blogs (2017); ABA Journal Blawg 100 (2015-16) (discontinued 2018)
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by John Wesley Hall
Criminal Defense Lawyer and
Search and seizure law consultant
Little Rock, Arkansas
Contact: forhall @ aol.com / The Book
www.johnwesleyhall.com -
© 2003-24,
online since Feb. 24, 2003 Approx. 425,000 visits (non-robot) since 2012 Approx. 45,000 posts since 2003 (27,400+ on WordPress as of 7/23/24) -
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Fourth Amendment cases,
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Congressional Research Service:
--Electronic Communications Privacy Act (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 -
"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 -
"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!”
---Pepé Le Pew "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)
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Category Archives: Qualified immunity
E.D.Cal.: Failure to provide medical care to an arrestee can be a 4A issue
Arrestee plaintiff pled due process, but it’s a Fourth Amendment claim for not “provid[ing] objectively reasonable post-arrest [medical] care to Plaintiff, a non-pretrial detainee, by ‘imped[ing] the medical staff from completing their task and pressuring them to discharge [Plaintiff],’ which … Continue reading
W.D.Pa.: Losing suppression motion then pleading nolo was collateral estoppel in later civil case
Plaintiff raised a search issue in her underlying criminal case and lost. Later, she pled nolo and thus could not appeal. That’s final enough for collateral estoppel to apply in her § 1983 case. Harr v. Washington Area Humane Soc’y, … Continue reading
NC: Warrant not needed to access data from GPS for post-conviction supervision
The data generated from the GPS attached to defendant as part of his post-conviction supervision can be accessed by law enforcement without a warrant. State v. Thomas, 2024 N.C. App. LEXIS 687 (Sep. 3, 2024). The Tenth Circuit has made … Continue reading
D.Minn.: Warrantless ion scan of car door handle was reasonable
A DNA ion scan of a car door handle was reasonable, relying on United States v. Jones, 2024 WL 1810220 (D. Minn. Apr. 25, 2024), finding no reasonable expectation of privacy in an ion scan on an apartment door from … Continue reading
W.D.Wash.: Warrantless arrest in def’s doorway violated 4A
Defendant’s warrantless arrest in his doorway violated the Fourth Amendment. After objecting, defendant acceded to their demands when they pulled a Taser on him. The remedy of what to do with his statement will be addressed later. United States v. … Continue reading
N.D.Cal.: SW affidavit need only “tend to show” a violation of law for a SW to issue
Defendant posted anonymously about killing libtards and their children (“parasites”) and “black robed despots” (judges), and he was a San Jose police officer. Officers knew he had nine guns. Officers got a search warrant for his computer to link him … Continue reading
N.D.Ohio: Cell phone next to seized drugs was nexus for SW
“In sum, the search warrant affidavit contained considerably more than the mere fact that Bell was arrested with the cell phone on his person. Rather, law enforcement found the cell phone on Bell’s person near ‘the very drugs’ he has … Continue reading
CA5: Sounds of a fight inside at a domestic call justified this warrantless entry
Officers responded to a domestic disturbance call and heard shouting inside that made them believe there was a fight inside. Summary judgment for the officers in a warrantless entry case was properly granted. Ramirez v. Killian, 2024 U.S. App. LEXIS … Continue reading
CA9: Dog handler allegedly allowing police dog to excessively bite ptf denied QI
“Viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to Rock, Miller allowed the canine to continue biting Rock even though he was unarmed, did not present an immediate threat to the officers or others, and did not resist or actively … Continue reading
CA8: Changing the inventory search argument on appeal was waiver
Defendant’s chain of custody argument after an inventory search was differently articulated than in the district court so it’s not preserved. United States v. Edwards, 2024 U.S. App. LEXIS 19568 (8th Cir. Aug. 6, 2024).* Defendant’s nolo plea waived his … Continue reading
CA7: No court has suppressed a Playpen SW, and changing the argument up a bit doesn’t succeed either
Every court to have dealt with the good faith exception in Playpen warrants has sustained them. This case attempts a different casting of the argument, but it’s rejected too. United States v. Dorosheff, 2024 U.S. App. LEXIS 19590 (7th Cir. … Continue reading
S.D.N.Y.: Slapping ptf during her arrest to control her not shown to be unreasonable
Plaintiff does not plausibly allege that slapping during arrest to control her was objectively unreasonable. Harding v. Gould, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 141944 (S.D.N.Y. Aug. 9, 2024).* The officer here shot and killed a 13-year-old holding and raising a toy … Continue reading
CADC: Ptf’s arrest on mistaken identity was still reasonable
The District Court correctly granted qualified immunity to an officer who detained plaintiff due to a mistaken identity fugitive warrant because there was no showing that any reasonable official in the defendant’s shoes would have understood that he was violating … Continue reading
CA9: Where officers were attempting to de-escalate a situation, warning about deadly force not required
A warning before deadly force would be used was contrary to the officers’ efforts to de-escalate the situation. Otherwise qualified immunity applies. Eyre v. City of Fairbanks, 2024 U.S. App. LEXIS 19770 (9th Cir. Aug. 7, 2024) (2-1).* Plaintiff’s claim … Continue reading
DC: Illegal stop led to finding weapon, and it was not attenuated
Defendant was subjected to a stop that violated the Fourth Amendment. Information from that stop sufficiently led to a search of a dwelling producing a gun. That was fruit of the poisonous tree. There was a first search that could … Continue reading
CA6: Knowing of a search starts the SoL from any claim on it
Knowing of a search starts the statute of limitations for any claim on it. Reguli v. Russ, 2024 U.S. App. LEXIS 19008 (6th Cir. July 31, 2024). Defendant waived his motion to suppress by not adequately supporting it with factual … Continue reading