November 2026 S M T W T F S 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 Archives
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Recent Posts
- D.Ariz.: Smell of alcohol in the car on Navajo Nation was PC
- NY3: No REP in parole GPS monitoring as to police
- TX: An entry into a person’s homestead for civil discovery has limits
- S.D.W.Va.: Subpoenas for records on advocacy positions violated 1A
- CA10: Investigative detention that went on for hours did not become an arrest
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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 -
Latest Slip Opinions:
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Foreign Intell.Surv.Ct.
FDsys, many district courts, other federal courts
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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: Staleness
NC: “Thursday” in a SW affidavit means the previous Thursday, and the search warrant wasn’t stale when issued
This case started with an anonymous letter about alleged drug sales at defendant’s residence. A trash pull was conducted on “Thursday.” Read in context, that means the previous Thursday, and the search warrant wasn’t stale when issued. State v. Teague, … Continue reading
IL: PC existed ten days after a crime to seek the weapon involved in the crime
There was probable cause for a search warrant for defendant’s house for a firearm involved in a crime ten days after the crime. Firearms are possessions usually kept. People v. Rodriguez, 2018 IL App (1st) 141379-B, 2018 Ill. App. LEXIS … Continue reading
S.D.W.Va.: Def’s admissions on body camera duffle bag wasn’t his denies him standing
“The body camera recording clearly shows that Defendant denied any ownership interest in the duffel bag at the time of the stop. As such, the Court finds that Defendant voluntarily abandoned the duffel bag and therefore lost any reasonable expectation … Continue reading
PA: Date typo in affidavit for SW could be corrected in context of totality
A typographical error in a date of an occurence in the affidavit for search warrant for the year (2013 instead of 2014) could be overlooked in context of the affidavit as a whole which showed it a mere typo. Commonwealth … Continue reading
E.D.Mich.: Def’s disclaiming ownership of cell phone when seized is a lack of standing, even when he claimed it after it rang
Defendant had no standing to challenge a search of a cell phone found in his car that he said belonged to his girlfriend. “Jackson does not deny that he disclaimed ownership of the phone at the time it was seized. … Continue reading
D.N.J.: Previous finding of good faith applies to later Franks challenge
Defendant had already filed a suppression motion and lost on good faith. Now he files a motion based on Franks that statements of witnesses in quote marks weren’t accurate. The previous finding of good faith carries over to here, and … Continue reading
CA11: While time wasn’t clearly stated, it was inferred on the totality; therefore, not stale
While the affidavit for the search warrant didn’t clearly specify a time frame, it was inferred, and it was clearly reasonable to conclude on the totality that the defendant would still have the sought after images on his computer. United … Continue reading
UT: While the CI’s stories alone were weak, police corroborated them
The two CI’s stories were weak in themselves, but the police succeeded in corroborating enough to rise to probable cause. State v. Matheson, 2018 Utah App. LEXIS 66 (Apr. 13, 2018).* Hitting the lane dividing line was justification for the … Continue reading
N.D.Ohio: There was a fair inference business records would be at def’s house
When a white collar investigation is underway, the staleness inquiry is more flexible because records, as opposed to drugs, are regularly kept for a long time. It was reasonable here to conclude that business records would be found at defendant’s … Continue reading
OH7: 23 days isn’t stale in a SW for guns
The police were in defendant’s house and observed guns. They didn’t realize that he was a felon in possession until two weeks later. Then they sought a warrant 23 days after seeing the guns. That wasn’t unreasonable considering the fact … Continue reading
D.Minn.: Older information about drugs confirmed by an ion scan of door knob 72 hours before SW not stale
Officers received detailed information in May 2017 of several being involved in the drug trade in April 2017. This resulted in a search warrant of others. Another CI provided information about June 2017. “In addition to Defendant being seen in … Continue reading
GA: Def failed to show standing in apt he was arrested in in early morning hours
Being arrested in an apartment that’s not yours doesn’t confer standing without some proof of a relationship to the property. The evidence at the suppression hearing did not address defendant’s status relative to the apartment; i.e., whether he was the … Continue reading
S.D.W.Va.: SW for apartment five days after car was found nearby with PC inside it wasn’t stale
Defendant stopped at a DUI checkpoint, officers could see marijuana through the window, and then defendant fled the checkpoint. Officers gave chase. They found the car at an apartment complex, seemingly abandoned, parked with the door open and engine running. … Continue reading
CA6: SW for house where CP was created and sex trafficking occurred wasn’t stale after two months
Defendant was convicted of creating child pornography and sex trafficking minors. The search warrant was issued two months after the last act, but the list of acts (photography of CP; beatings) that occurred in defendant’s residence and the things sought … Continue reading
D.Mont.: Gun possession not stale after 5 months
A CI’s reference to guns in defendant’s house in Dec. 2016 was not stale by April 2017. Defendant’s arguments about a Franks violation are rejected for lack of materiality to the finding of probable cause. United States v. Wilson, 2017 … Continue reading
N.D.Ga.: Six month old information in gun sale case wasn’t stale
Defendant was alleged to have sold quantities of firearms more than once. Six month old information in a gun sale case was not stale. United States v. Fisher-Bland, 2017 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 199259 (N.D. Ga. Nov. 16, 2017), adopted, 2017 … Continue reading
OH3: PC for anticipatory SW exists here merely because drug traffickers commonly use their home to store drugs
The trial court did not err by denying the motion to suppress because the issuing judge had a substantial basis for concluding that probable cause for an anticipatory search warrant existed. Evidence of drug trafficking, without more, furnished probable cause … Continue reading
OH11: Admin SW for hoarding was issued with PC and wasn’t stale
Defendant here was referred to as “having a hoarding issue” because of a growing collection of junk in his yard and up against his house that was flammable and attractive to rodents. He was prosecuted for the exterior junk and … Continue reading
D.Kan.: CP SW not stale [are they ever?]
The search warrant for child pornography was not stale, based on the officer’s experience. [Since no case has ever found staleness in child pornography cases, why don’t they just cut to the chase and take judicial notice?] United States v. … Continue reading
PA: SW for firearm in defendant’s home was stale 15 months after the murder (but harmless)
A search warrant for a murder weapon in defendant’s house was stale when it was issued 15 months after the murder. It was, however, harmless error in this case. Commonwealth v. Jacoby, 2017 Pa. LEXIS 2274 (Sept. 28, 2017) (separate … Continue reading