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- CA8: Def’s 20 prior arrests helped show voluntariness of consent
- TX1: No standing to challenge seizure of ketamine off co-def, but PC was lacking for his own arrest
- KS: 13 days pole camera surveillance violated no REP
- E.D.Va.: WaPo reporter’s SW was overbroad and 1A protected
- CAAF: GFE applies to cell phone’s geolocation data because of substantial basis for the search authorization
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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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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)
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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: Seizure
IN: Refusal to stop for “Hey, I need to talk to you,” didn’t justify an arrest
Refusal to stop for “Hey, I need to talk to you,” didn’t justify an arrest in Indiana. It wasn’t a stop to flee from. Miller v. State, 2016 Ind. App. LEXIS 33 (Feb. 9, 2016). Defendant’s stop for criminal trespass … Continue reading
D.Nev.: Since possession of neither shotgun nor hypodermic needle are crimes, stop invalid
Police received a call about a man passed out in a Lexus in a parking lot with a hypodermic needle sticking in his arm and a shotgun next to him. When they got there, defendant was out of the car, … Continue reading
CA11: Miami’s seizure and destruction of ptf’s “ugly” sailboat stated a 4A claim under Soldal
Plaintiff lived on his sailboat in the City of Miami on state waters. He was stopped by marine officers who complained of his lack of property sanitary facilities and not having a good enough anchor light. They accused him of … Continue reading
IL: When a vehicle is stopped because of a warrant on owner, even when discovered owner not driving, officer can ask for DL
Defendant’s van was pulled over because there was a warrant for the owner, a woman. The man driving could not be the owner, and the officer asked for his DL, which was permissible and lawfully incident to the stop under … Continue reading
CA11: You can’t sue over a public official trying to copy a document you claim gives you authority to enter the building
Plaintiff came into a Florida Town Hall with a videographer in tow with a purported “court order” from Atlantic City NJ allegedly authorizing copying of records. When an official tried to copy the order, plaintiff grabbed it from the copier, … Continue reading
D.N.H.: Seizure of a pseudo-fireman’s camera for impersonating a first responder didn’t violate First or Fourth Amendments [Updated: aff’d 12/23/16]
Seizure of the named plaintiff photographer’s camera for evidence of his impersonating a first responder at the scene of a fatal accident for potential proof of the offense failed to state a claim under the First or Fourth Amendments. Plaintiff … Continue reading
W.D.Pa.: Gun abandoned in flight from police wasn’t the product of an illegal seizure
Abandoned firearm in flight from the police in an allegedly illegal stop isn’t a seizure, and the gun is admissible. United States v. Giles, 2016 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 200 (W.D.Pa. Jan. 4, 2016).* The CI’s tip was that he’d seen … Continue reading
D.Nev.: “[T]he government does not require probable cause to ‘search’ its own records.”
Assuming defendant had standing to a residence as an overnight guest, the police had specific information linking him to the residence and probable cause for a search warrant. A check of DMV records on him did not require probable cause. … Continue reading
CA4: Def did not comply with police commands and wasn’t seized until after he dropped his gun
Defendant was about to be seized when the police car pulled up behind his parked car with emergency lights and officers approached. He got out of his car with gun in hand, at first ignoring police commands, and then he … Continue reading
LA4: Protective sweep before def arrested in pajamas reentered to get dressed was reasonable
Defendant was arrested in his pajamas, and it was appropriate for the police to conduct a protective sweep for others before he was permitted to get dressed to leave. A shotgun was validly found propped against the wall in the … Continue reading
WA: Ex parte order freezing criminal def’s bank account was not functional equivalent of a SW and unreasonable
An ex parte order to freeze a bank account of a theft suspect violated the Washington Constitution because bank records are protected there. The trial court’s order was without legal authority, and it was not the functional equivalent of a … Continue reading
TX6: “[U]nder Rodriguez, Fourth Amendment considerations are both qualitative and temporal”
The smell of marijuana on defendant’s clothing noticed during the traffic stop and his heavily sweating during the stop although the temperature was in the high 20’s to low 30’s and travel plans that were suspicious all added up to … Continue reading
IL: When a stop is based on an “investigative alert,” the basis has to be shown to be reasonable; here, the state couldn’t
Defendant was stopped on an “investigative alert,” which would have been sufficient if there was reasonable suspicion under the collective knowledge doctrine. There was no showing of the basis for the alert, and the stop was thus without reasonable suspicion … Continue reading
CA6: Def’s failure to submit to officer’s show of authority showed it was not a seizure
“The United States appeals the district court’s order suppressing a firearm found in defendant Samuel Johnson’s car during a traffic stop. The district court ruled that because the police had unconstitutionally seized Johnson before he rolled through a stop sign, … Continue reading
IA: Use of siren and commands about where to stand during stop was a seizure
“Here, the evidence establishes that Officer Aljets exercised his authority to request Williams stop, rendering the encounter a seizure. The officer testified he ‘hit the siren horn’ which made a ‘whoop whoop’ sound in order to get Williams’s attention. The … Continue reading
ID: Auto search doesn’t have to stop where items in plain view were seized
Observation of contraband in plain view justified a search of a vehicle. The officer did not have to stop when he seized that which was first seen. State v. Anderson, 2015 Ida. App. LEXIS 118 (Nov. 17, 2015). Defendant was … Continue reading
GA: Overlong stop was reasonable here because officer was dealing with two cars
Defendant was not seized, although the stop was long. There was another driver in another car also being dealt with, and the officer had to get another to the scene. Defendant was never told he was under arrest, nor was … Continue reading
CA10: Seizure of def’s unlabeled bag from Amtrak baggage car to carry it through train was a Fourth Amendment seizure
Defendant was riding Amtrak from Los Angeles which stops in Albuquerque. As usual, the DEA boarded the train. After a walk through they seized defendant’s unlabeled bag from the baggage car and carried it through the train looking for its … Continue reading
D.D.C.: Asking a man on the street to pull up shirt to expose waistband is not a seizure
Under D.C.Cir. case law, an officer driving by a person in a high crime area and asking him to pull up his shirt or expose his waistband is not a seizure. Here, officers did that with a small group and … Continue reading