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- S.D.Ohio: Affidavit alleged only that drug dealers use cell phones, and that’s not PC; but GFE saves it
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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)
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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: Informant hearsay
MO: Omission from affidavit that CI was “working off a case” not material–it’s virtually a given
An alleged material omission for Franks purposes was not material because adding it in would essentially be misleading. Telling the issuing magistrate that the CI was “working off a case” isn’t really required under Franks because that’s usually a given … Continue reading
D.S.D.: Def showed that CI had material information for suppression hearing; disclosure of identity ordered
This CI’s identity was shown to be material for the suppression motion because of his alleged motive to lie. Moreover, the government does not specify that the CI will or will not be called as a witness at trial. The … Continue reading
N.D.Iowa: Anonymous 911 call wasn’t good enough under Florida v. J.L.
This 911 call that defendant was likely with a gun was more like Florida v. J.L. than Naverette v. California, and it lacked indicia of reliability. While it’s a “close case,” the motion to suppress should be granted. “Nothing in … Continue reading
S.D.Fla.: When a cotenant with authority consents, the officers do not have to seek out the “target” for his consent
When a cotenant with authority consents, the officers do not have to seek out the “target” for his consent, too. United States v. Morales, 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 125085 (S.D.Fla. September 18, 2015), R&R 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 125086 (S.D.Fla. … Continue reading
CA9: Vague uncorroborated anonymous tip could not support warrant, which was also overbroad, and the good faith exception cannot apply
Officers received a vague anonymous tip relayed through an apartment manager about a tenant having ten pounds of marijuana. They were able to somehow link it to defendant, and they did a knock-and-talk. Defendant admitted to being a medical marijuana … Continue reading
D.S.C.: UnMirandized admission of gun in car created exigent circumstances
It was reasonable for the officer to ask about defendant having a firearm in the car when responding to a 911 call without Mirandizing him under its “public safety exception.” When defendant admitted there was a gun, the officer had … Continue reading
CA7: Two 911 calls about a road rage incident led to PC to search defendant’s car
A road rage incident was called into 911 twice by a woman involved who said the other driver was a man blocking her path, beating on her car window and shouting obscenities, and displaying a gun. When police arrived, they … Continue reading
TX6: Failure to cite state constitution and rules in argument on motion to suppress was waiver
While defendant’s motion to suppress cited the Fourth Amendment, the state constitution, and state criminal rules, at the hearing defendant mentioned only the Fourth Amendment, so the others were waived. Glenn v. State, 2015 Tex. App. LEXIS 9433 (Tex. App. … Continue reading
E.D.La.: Omitted informant information needs to be dispositive to undermine PC
More information could probably be included in all search warrant affidavits, but that doesn’t make them misleading for omissions. The omissions must be “dispositive” of probable cause, not just cast a little doubt on it. United States v. Wijetunge, 2015 … Continue reading
OH5: Citizen informant’s DUI tip line call wasn’t specific enough about DUI to support a stop
Defendant’s wife called a DUI tip line that he was driving having consumed alcohol. An officer stopped him without waiting for a traffic offense, which he would usually do. While she was an identified citizen informant, the tip was not … Continue reading
MA: A license plate reader is not treated as an anonymous informant with little or no credibility
A license plate reader is not treated as an anonymous informant with little or no credibility. It is based on a database that is sufficiently reliable to based a stop on. Commonwealth v. Ramos, 2015 Mass. App. LEXIS 116 (August … Continue reading
CA7: CI’s prediction of route of travel confirmed by GPS planted with SW was PC
CI’s prediction of defendant’s route of travel with heroin was corroborated by GPS placed on defendant’s car with a warrant. United States v. Reaves, 2015 U.S. App. LEXIS 13745 (7th Cir. August 6, 2015). A citizen informant called DC Metro … Continue reading
DC: Entry on a domestic dispute unjustified by exigency; everybody involved was outside the house
The entry into defendant’s house was not supported by exigency. The police interviewed the participants in a domestic dispute outside, and there was no reason at all to believe that there was someone in the house in need of aid. … Continue reading
D.Me.: Just having your stuff in a motel room rented by another doesn’t prove you’re an overnight guest
One defendant failed to even attempt to show standing in a motel room rented by a third man. The second defendant failed, too, but he was a little closer to the mark. Just having stuff in the room alone isn’t … Continue reading
S.D.Ohio: There was PC for a Facebook account SW
There was probable cause for a Facebook account search warrant for defendant’s account, and it was limited in time so it was not overbroad. Also, the good faith exception would apply. United States v. Lowry, 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 93257 … Continue reading
TN: CI’s reliability mooted by trash pull
Whether the CI was reliable was essentially moot based on a trash pull that showed all kinds of marijuana cuttings. State v. Altman, 2015 Tenn. Crim. App. LEXIS 556 (July 13, 2015).* [Usually, the courts say that the CI was … Continue reading
CA10: CI testified in 2255 there was no controlled buy supporting search warrant which Dist.Ct. credits; gun conviction set aside
The District Court held that there was a fraud on the court exception to AEDPA and set aside one of defendant’s convictions based on false evidence of a controlled buy by an informant related in a search warrant. The informant … Continue reading
CA9: Stone v. Powell bar and the full and fair litigation requirement survived adoption of the AEDPA
Stone v. Powell bar and the full and fair litigation requirement survived adoption of the habeas limitations of AEDPA. Newman v. Wengler, 2015 U.S. App. LEXIS 10094 (9th Cir. June 16, 2015). [This may be the only case to ever … Continue reading