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- CA6: State officer’s arrest for violation of federal MJ law likely wouldn’t violate 4A
- D.N.M.: Shared driveway outside of fence and gate was not curtilage
- CA6: Knowing passcode to cell phone shows common authority over it to consent
- VI: Smell of MJ no longer PC in VI since legalization
- Reason: 3 Charlotte Cops Resign After Group Chat Reveals Competition To Arrest the Most Black People
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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: Arrest or entry on arrest
W.D.Mich.: Def standing next door wasn’t on his property when the SW was executed at his house and could not be detained
A search warrant was issued for defendant’s house for two buys from it: one an hour earlier, and another a week earlier. The warrant authorized detention and search of persons found there. When 19 officers showed up to serve the … Continue reading
W.D.Ky.: Facially valid arrest warrant not undermined by def’s claim he had an alibi for crime
Defendant argues that the execution of the arrest warrant on him in his own house was invalid because he had an alibi for the time of the crime. That’s not up to the executing officers. The warrant was facially valid. … Continue reading
D.Minn.: USMJ who issues SW doesn’t have to recuse from deciding motion to suppress
The USMJ who issued the search warrant doesn’t need to recuse from deciding on a motion to suppress that warrant. “The Court also concludes that Strieff controls the analysis of Defendant’s challenge to his stop in Rock Island, Illinois. In … Continue reading
S.D.Ga.: Payton‘s standard is “reason to believe” under a common sense approach and not PC
The Payton standard for determining whether a person is home for execution of an arrest warrant is “reason to believe” under a common sense approach and not a more demanding probable cause requirement. In addition, defendant’s actions showed he abandoned … Continue reading
D.D.C.: Overdetention claim doesn’t lie under 4A but does under 5A
Plaintiff’s overdetention claim doesn’t lie under the Fourth Amendment but it does under the Fifth. “According to Jones, strip searching an inmate who has been ordered released before returning that inmate to the general population violates the Fourth Amendment unless … Continue reading
CA5: Franks violation states 4A claim with no qualified immunity
Defendant stated a Fourth Amendment claim for false arrest by a false affidavit for arrest, and the statute of limitations started to run on defendant’s acquittal. A Franks violation generally defeats qualified immunity. Winfrey v. Rogers, 2018 U.S. App. LEXIS … Continue reading
WaPo: ICE arrested a wanted man driving his pregnant wife to give birth. She drove herself to the hospital.
WaPo: ICE arrested a wanted man driving his pregnant wife to give birth. She drove herself to the hospital. by Alex Horton: ICE said the man, a Mexican national living illegally in the United States, is wanted in his home … Continue reading
M.D.Ala.: Unmarked pill bottle with apparent crack in it was in plain view during protective sweep after arrest in house
Officers came in defendant’s house with an arrest warrant for cocaine delivery. During a protective sweep, an unmarked pill bottle was seen and picked up. It was immediately apparent to the officers that the contents was likely crack cocaine and … Continue reading
S.D.N.Y.: When police come to def’s house with arrest warrant, cotenant’s denial he’s home isn’t binding on officers
Officers had good information where defendant lived, and they came with an arrest warrant. His cotenant denied he was there, which the officers did not have to take at face value. One FBI agent testified that cotenants frequently lie about … Continue reading
IN: Even though def called off drug deal with CI at last minute there still was RS
The CI was working off his own charges. The CI had to make several tries to make a deal with defendant, and, when it happened, there was advance planning related by the CI. They also were talking on a cell … Continue reading
CA3: Violation of Vienna Convention on arrest doesn’t lead to dismissal
“Dismissal of the indictment and suppression of evidence are not appropriate remedial measures for a violation of Article 36 [of the Vienna Convention] in this case.” Sanchez-Llamas v. Oregon, 548 U.S. 331, 350 (2006). United States v. Castillo, 2018 U.S. … Continue reading
E.D.Pa.: Arrest warrant for wrong name still had PC for def, and his arrest was based on PC
Defendant counsel was not ineffective for not pursuing a Fourth Amendment claim that the name in the arrest warrant was included by mistake. Officers told the magistrate as soon as they discovered it. Defendant’s arrest was still on probable cause. … Continue reading
OH11: Arrest warrant and knowing def home authorized entry to arrest
Officers had an arrest warrant for the defendant and they knew he was home. That was justification to enter. State v. Weaver, 2018-Ohio-2675, 2018 Ohio App. LEXIS 2898 (11th Dist. July 9, 2018). Defendant doesn’t allege any facts that his … Continue reading
CA7: Drug court staffers’ making arrests outside courthouse may have violated state law but were reasonable under 4A
In claims against a drug court out of control involving multi-month detentions for really short term ordered incarcerations, there was also a Fourth Amendment claim: Two drug court staffers, one a bailiff with no authority outside the courthouse, undertook to … Continue reading
The Virginian-Pilot: She spent 3 months in jail despite a Norfolk police video proving her innocence
The Virginian-Pilot: She spent 3 months in jail despite a Norfolk police video proving her innocence by Scott Daugherty She was allegedly in a video selling drugs. Only she wasn’t. They didn’t look for 114 days.
S.D.Ga.: CI information was a little stale, but the officer’s corroroboration was with current information and that overcame staleness
The CI’s information was a little dated and potentially stale, but it was corroborated by current information and that was probable cause. United States v. Mobley, 2018 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 101640 (S.D. Ga. June 18, 2018). “In this case, by … Continue reading
CA2: A material witness seized and never presented to a judge stated a claim; and no QI
Plaintiff was held without a hearing as an alleged material witness, but never presented to a court. The district court granted qualified immunity, and the court of appeals reversed. Her rights were clearly established that she was entitled to be … Continue reading
SCOTUSBlog: Opinion analysis: With facts like these … Lozman v. City of Riviera Beach
SCOTUSBlog: Opinion analysis: With facts like these … Lozman v. City of Riviera Beach by Heidi Kitrosser:
CA3: Hiding computer evidence when def learns SW coming is “contemporaneously with arrest” for U.S.S.G. 3C1.1
Defendant panicked when he heard the police were coming to his house to search, and he moved files to his computer recycling bin. The court finds this was “contemporaneously with arrest” for U.S.S.G. 3C1.1, but, because they were easily recovered, … Continue reading
NYTimes: Ketamine Used to Subdue Dozens at Request of Minneapolis Police, Report Says
NYTimes: Ketamine Used to Subdue Dozens at Request of Minneapolis Police, Report Says by Christopher Mele: