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- GA: Raising particularity in half of one sentence of argument isn’t a presentation of the issue
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- GA: No case says SW required to ask for cell phone password
- VA: Body cam video of valid arrest would not be suppressed
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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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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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General (many free):
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Federal Law Enforcement Training Center Resources
FBI Domestic Investigations and Operations Guide (2008) (pdf)
DEA Agents Manual (2002) (download)
DOJ Computer Search Manual (2009) (pdf)
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
Privacy Foundation
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NACDL’s Domestic Drone Information Center
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Criminal Appeal (post-conviction) (9th Cir.)
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)
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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: Scope of search
D.P.R.: Protective sweep of garage and upstairs was valid; plain view sustained, but search of closed bag suppressed
“[T]he court finds that extending the protective sweep to the garage and the second floor was within the bounds set forth by the Supreme Court in Buie and the First Circuit in United States v. Winston, 444 F.3d 115, 120 … Continue reading
CAAF: “Though a temporal limitation is one possible method of tailoring a search authorization, it is by no means a requirement.”
A temporal limitation on a computer search isn’t practical because it could unreasonably limit investigators’ ability to search for files within the search authorization. “Though a temporal limitation is one possible method of tailoring a search authorization, it is by … Continue reading
D.N.J.: Google has to produce emails stored overseas
Google responds to subpoenas and search warrants for email accounts from its California headquarters. The fact that the actual data may be stored in a server in another country doesn’t matter–Google still has to produce. In re Search Warrant to … Continue reading
N.D.Tex.: SW for apartment didn’t extend to vehicle
Search warrant for defendant’s apartment didn’t extend to his vehicle, which the government concedes. The warrantless search of the vehicle along with the apartment exceeded the warrant, and the vehicle search is suppressed. United States v. Salinas, 2017 U.S. Dist. … Continue reading
D.Conn.: SW for drugs in house supported plain view of gun under mattress
There was evidence linking defendant’s alleged drug offenses to his home, so the warrant for his home was justified. A drug search is intensive, and the gun found under a mattress was in plain view. United States v. Reyes, 2017 … Continue reading
NE: SW for property includes vehicles found and belonging there
Search warrant for property includes vehicles parked on the property that are connected to the property [as in the owner]. State v. Hidalgo, 296 Neb. 912, 2017 Neb. LEXIS 87 (June 9, 2017). Officers coming upon an assault in progress, … Continue reading
W.D.Ky.: SW for premises permits search of any vehicle parked on the property
The search warrant for the house in this case permitted a search of any vehicles on the premises, not just those belonging to the owner of the residence. In any event, the good faith exception applies. United States v. Keeling, … Continue reading
CA8: Warrant was broad, but not constitutionally overbroad for QI under Messerschmidt
An anonymous tip corroborated by a jailhouse telephone call showed probable cause to believe plaintiff was in possession of a pet deer in violation of state game regulations. A search warrant was issued that was broader than just that one … Continue reading
Cal.6th: SW for house for CP didn’t permit search of second house found behind it
Police linked an IP address at the residence of the owner in San José to child pornography, and they obtain a search warrant for the Reynolds residence, garages, and outbuildings. They searched Reynolds’ place for child pornography and didn’t find … Continue reading
VT: SWs for animals are different than for other property; more likely subject to exigency
Search warrants for animals are different than for other property in that they are alive and more likely subject to exigent circumstances because animal welfare is always a consideration. When executing a warrant for two animals, others apparently in distress … Continue reading
IN: Stop was reasonably extended because the LPN didn’t match vehicle
A stop was reasonably extended by the officer because the LPN didn’t come back to the vehicle. Browder v. State, 2017 Ind. App. LEXIS 212 (May 22, 2017).* The affidavit for search warrant was not bare bones, and the search … Continue reading
Cal.4th: Passenger’s parole status permitted search of entire passenger compartment
Defendant was in a car with a parolee. After a valid stop, the parolee gave a false name, and the officer eventually got the right name and parole status. A search of the whole car was permissible even though the … Continue reading
OH12: Police with SW for clothes didn’t need to determine whose were in a clothes pile before searching it
The search warrant was for a multitude of things in defendant’s house, including cell phones and clothing worn during the crime. A clothes pile could be searched without first determining whose clothes were apparently there. The pockets could be searched, … Continue reading
FL: Photographs of house interior taken during search for bank card could be used at trial
Defendant was a suspect in a murder, and the police had probable cause for a search warrant for his house to look for the victim’s bank card. They did not find the bank card, but they took 150 photographs of … Continue reading
CA4: $41,000 cash could be seized in execution of a warrant for marriage and immigration fraud based on def’s explanation
$41,000 cash could be seized in execution of a warrant for marriage and immigration fraud even though its evidentiary significance wasn’t instantly obvious. United States v. Kimble, 2017 U.S. App. LEXIS 7776 (4th Cir. May 2, 2017):
W.D.N.Y.: Despite bad SW drafting, text messages are “records” in a cell phone
“[N]otwithstanding the warrant’s poor grammar and ‘unwieldy’ language,” the court finds that text messages are included within the definition of “records” in the defendant’s cell phone. United States v. Swinton, 2017 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 62172 (W.D. N.Y. April 24, 2017):
CA8: Once PC for vehicle established, search can go wherever the things to be sought could be found; air compressor could be broken into for drugs
Defendant’s traffic stop was not unlawfully prolonged given the officer’s observations of the truck’s contents, the seeming implausibilities and inconsistencies in the responses to the officer’s routine questions, the reasonable suspicion the officer developed as a result of those improbable … Continue reading
CA5: SW for 320 CR 401 didn’t include 320A; telephonic warrant fails for lack of a record of what caused to issue
A search warrant for 320 CR 401 did not objectively include 320A CR 401, a different address and building 200 yards away with a separate electric meter, so summary judgment was improperly granted the police. In addition, a telephone warrant … Continue reading
TN: Scope of probation search can be limited by the terms of the search condition
The probation search here lacked reasonable suspicion because the CI wasn’t adequately corroborated to amount to reasonable suspicion. Also, the probation search here was limited to the areas in the house controlled by the defendant’s under the search condition imposed … Continue reading
D.Me.: Attic is part of the premises for consent or a SW
The attic is a part of the premises, and it’s part of a consent to search a house. The First Circuit already held that a search warrant for a house includes the attic. United States v. Gardiner, 2017 U.S. Dist. … Continue reading