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- MD: Hot pursuit can be days later, here exigent CSLI to find him
- D.D.C.: Alleged illegal arrest doesn’t void DNA SW
- S.D.Fla.: Inventory that omitted “miscellaneous personal items” was not unreasonable
- CA4: That ptf charged with witness intimidation didn’t do it again wasn’t material for Franks
- CO: Not 4A or state constitutional violation for govt to access def’s computer via peer-to-peer sharing with BitTorrent software
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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
Military Courts: C.A.A.F., Army, AF, N-M, CG, SF
State courts (and some USDC opinions)
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To search Search and Seizure on Lexis.com $ -
Research Links:
Supreme Court:
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Solicitor General's site
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Briefs online (but no amicus briefs)
Oyez Project (NWU)
"On the Docket"–Medill
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S.Ct. Com't'ry: Law.com
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General (many free):
LexisWeb
Google Scholar | Google
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Lexis.com $
Lexis.com (criminal law/ 4th Amd) $
Findlaw.com
Findlaw.com (4th Amd)
Westlaw.com $
F.R.Crim.P. 41
www.fd.org
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
Electronic Frontier Foundation
NACDL’s Domestic Drone Information Center
Electronic Privacy Information Center
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: SCOTUS
reason.com: Today at SCOTUS: Warrantless Drunk Driving Tests and the Fourth Amendment
reason.com: Today at SCOTUS: Warrantless Drunk Driving Tests and the Fourth Amendment by Damon Root: Today the U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral argument in three consolidated cases that pose the following question: “Whether, in the absence of a warrant, … Continue reading
SCOTUS: Strickland’s deference to counsel’s decisions applies to appellate counsel [didn’t we all assume that anyway? Not CA6]
The Strickland “doubly deferential” standard of trial counsel’s failure to challenge a search issue because it would not prevail applies to appellate counsel, too. Woods v. Etherton, 15-723 (U.S. April 4, 2016):
U.S.News & World Report: Merrick Garland’s Trunk-Search Ruling Gives Some Defense Advocates Chills [Typical Internet headline hyperbole]
U.S.News & World Report: Merrick Garland’s Trunk-Search Ruling Gives Some Defense Advocates Chills Scholars say, however, the decision is within the judicial mainstream. [The headline alone is enough to make me not even want to read it because the writer … Continue reading
WaPo: President Obama to nominate Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court, sources say
WaPo: President Obama to nominate Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court, sources say
Reason.com: Meet Paul Watford, One of Obama’s Potential Nominees to Replace Scalia on the Supreme Court
Reason.com: Meet Paul Watford, One of Obama’s Potential Nominees to Replace Scalia on the Supreme Court by Damon Root.
Reason.com: 4 Things to Know About Sri Srinivasan, Obama’s Potential Nominee to Replace Scalia on the Supreme Court
Reason.com: 4 Things to Know About Sri Srinivasan, Obama’s Potential Nominee to Replace Scalia on the Supreme Court by Damon Root:
NYTimes: Editorial: The Supreme Court and Police Searches
NYTimes: Editorial: The Supreme Court and Police Searches: Should incriminating evidence be used against a defendant if it was discovered in the course of an illegal police stop? That was the question before the Supreme Court on Monday, the first … Continue reading
NLJ: In First Arguments Since Scalia’s Death, Two Textbook Cases for the Justice
NLJ: In First Arguments Since Scalia’s Death, Two Textbook Cases for the Justice by Marcia Coyle: On their first day on the bench after the death of Justice Antonin Scalia, eight justices of the U.S. Supreme Court found themselves in … Continue reading
SCOTUS back Monday: Thomson Reuters: Scalia’s absence to be felt as U.S. Supreme Court returns
Thomson Reuters: Scalia’s absence to be felt as U.S. Supreme Court returns by Lawrence Hurley: WASHINGTON, Feb 21 (Reuters) – The eight remaining members of the U.S. Supreme Court will feel the absence of their late colleague Justice Antonin Scalia … Continue reading
U.S. Law Week: Why the Criminal Defense Bar Will Miss Scalia
U.S. Law Week: Why the Criminal Defense Bar Will Miss Scalia by Lance J. Rogers: U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia was famous for his acid rhetoric, unapologetic defense of the death penalty and fierce opposition to progressive causes like … Continue reading
Reason.com: Scalia’s Mixed Drug War Record
Reason.com: Scalia’s Mixed Drug War Record by Jacob Sullum: Drug cases show the late justice’s fickle fidelity to the Fourth Amendment and federalism. For many years drug prohibition has been the main factor undermining the Fourth Amendment’s ban on “unreasonable … Continue reading
SCOTUS has two weeks of arguments starting Monday, one a Fourth Amendment case
For those who don’t keep up, which is what I used to do until the Internet made it easier, SCOTUS has two weeks of oral arguments coming up: As in Feb. 23-25, 29 and Mar. 1-2 (you’ll see two more … Continue reading
Cato: Justice Scalia: Underappreciated Fourth Amendment Defender
Cato: Justice Scalia: Underappreciated Fourth Amendment Defender by Jonathan Blanks: In addition to his many judicial bona fides, Justice Antonin Scalia was an underappreciated defender of the Fourth Amendment. With his typical thoroughness and deep textualism that reshaped American judging, … Continue reading
NYTimes: How America Was Lost
NYTimes: How America Was Lost by Paul Krugman: Once upon a time, the death of a Supreme Court justice wouldn’t have brought America to the edge of constitutional crisis. But that was a different country, with a very different Republican … Continue reading
Reason: Scalia’s Liberal Tendencies
Reason: Scalia’s Liberal Tendencies by Jacob Sullum: The late Supreme Court justice was inaccurately described as “authoritarian.” [He was generally good on the Fourth and strong on the Sixth, but not at all on the Fifth, Eighth, and Fourteenth Amendments. … Continue reading
SCOTUSBlog: Is a recess appointment to the Court an option?
SCOTUSBlog: Is a recess appointment to the Court an option? by Lyle Denniston: The Senate is currently in recess until February 22. The recess began on Friday. Whether this opens an opportunity for a recess appointment depends upon how Senate … Continue reading
SCOTUSblog: Supreme Court vacancies in presidential election years
SCOTUSblog: Supreme Court vacancies in presidential election years by Amy Howe: In the wake of the death of Justice Antonin Scalia, questions have arisen about whether there is a standard practice of not nominating and confirming Supreme Court Justices during … Continue reading
WaPo: Future of the exclusionary rule? Preview of Utah v. Strieff
WaPo: Preview of Utah v. Strieff by Orin Kerr: SCOTUSblog has posted a preview I authored about Utah v. Strieff, a Fourth Amendment case on the scope of the exclusionary rule. Here’s the introduction:
Atlantic: None to the Right of Samuel Alito
Atlantic: None to the Right of Samuel Alito by Tom Donnelly and Brianne Gorod: A decade into his tenure on the Court, Samuel Alito has emerged as the most solidly conservative justice on the bench.
SCOTUS grants cert on whether the Fourth Amendment supports a malicious prosecution claim
Manuel v. City of Joliet, 14-9496, cert. granted Jan. 15, 2016. Issue: Whether an individual’s Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable seizure continues beyond legal process so as to allow a malicious prosecution claim based upon the Fourth … Continue reading