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- N.D.Ala.: All parts of a SW are read in context, and that narrows it so it’s not overbroad
- WA: No immediate bail for DV arrest violates neither 4A nor due process
- S.D.N.Y.: Overseas seizure of Russian oligarch’s megayacht not governed by 4A
- CA7: No IAC in failure to more aggressively pursue Franks challenge
- CA9: Compelled use of fingerprint to open a cell phone didn’t violate 5A
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ABA Journal Web 100, Best Law Blogs (2017); ABA Journal Blawg 100 (2015-16) (discontinued 2018)
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by John Wesley Hall
Criminal Defense Lawyer and
Search and seizure law consultant
Little Rock, Arkansas
Contact: forhall @ aol.com / The Book
www.johnwesleyhall.com -
© 2003-24,
online since Feb. 24, 2003 Approx. 425,000 visits (non-robot) since 2012 Approx. 45,000 posts since 2003 (26,730+ on WordPress as of 12/31/23) -
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Fourth Amendment cases,
citations, and links -
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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)
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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) -
“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 -
"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] -
“You know, most men would get discouraged by now. Fortunately for you, I am not most men!”
---Pepé Le Pew "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)
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Category Archives: Body cameras
The Cap Times: Wisconsin Assembly approves bill to limit release of police body camera footage
The Cap Times: Wisconsin Assembly approves bill to limit release of police body camera footage by Jessie Opoien: Public access to police body camera footage would be limited under a bill approved Thursday by the Wisconsin Assembly. The legislation is … Continue reading
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Public would be kept from getting police body camera footage under Wisconsin bill
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Public would be kept from getting police body camera footage under Wisconsin bill by Patrick Marley: MADISON – Police body camera footage would be kept from the public in many cases,under a bill the state Assembly is … Continue reading
Chicago Sun-Times: After body cameras on Chicago cops, could gun cameras be next?
Chicago Sun-Times: After body cameras on Chicago cops, could gun cameras be next? by Mitch Dudek: All Chicago police officers on patrol will be wearing chest-mounted body cameras by the end of the year — but could gun-mounted cameras be next?
Techdirt: Oversight Board Report On DC Police Cameras Contradicts Earlier Report’s Claims
Techdirt: Oversight Board Report On DC Police Cameras Contradicts Earlier Report’s Claims by Tim Cushing: Less than a month after a first report was delivered on Washington, DC police body camera use, a second one has arrived. And it seems … Continue reading
The New American: Utah Nurse Waives Lawsuit, Settles for $500,000 in Patient Privacy Case Written by Bob Adelmann
The New American: Utah Nurse Waives Lawsuit, Settles for $500,000 in Patient Privacy Case by Bob Adelmann:
Newsweek: Opinion: So If Police Body Cams Don’t Work, What’s the Solution?
Newsweek: Opinion: So If Police Body Cams Don’t Work, What’s the Solution? by Josephy Marguilies: The police must become part of a robust partnership involving the community and other municipal agencies. Collectively and creatively, the members of this partnership must … Continue reading
WaPo: Oversight board finds many D.C. officers fail to properly use body cameras
WaPo: Oversight board finds many D.C. officers fail to properly use body cameras by Peter Hermann: More than a third of cases investigated by a D.C. police oversight board after complaints were made about officers’ conduct this past year involved … Continue reading
NY Times: Body Cameras Have Little Effect on Police Behavior, Study Says
NY Times: Body Cameras Have Little Effect on Police Behavior, Study Says by Amanda Ripley and Timothy Williams:
NYTimes: A Big Test of Police Body Cameras Defies Expectations
NYTimes: A Big Test of Police Body Cameras Defies Expectations by Amanda Ripley:
Newsweek: Gun Cameras Might Be the Next Body Cameras as Police Try Them Out
Newsweek: Gun Cameras Might Be the Next Body Cameras as Police Try Them Out by Jessica Kwon: Gun cameras – mounted on officers’ weapons instead of their bodies – are the latest recording technology some police departments are considering adding … Continue reading
Baltimore Sun: Baltimore prosecutors drop dozens more cases involving indicted officers, others shown in body camera footage
Baltimore Sun: Baltimore prosecutors drop dozens more cases involving indicted officers, others shown in body camera footage by Kevin Rector: Prosecutors in Baltimore have decided to drop dozens of additional criminal cases that relied on the testimony of eight city … Continue reading
Texas Observer: Body Cam Policies in Texas Exacerbate a System Designed to Protect Police, Critics Say
Texas Observer: Body Cam Policies in Texas Exacerbate a System Designed to Protect Police, Critics Say by Michael Barajas: Civil rights advocates worry interpretation of a 2015 body camera law could help cops avoid prosecution as much as it ensures … Continue reading
Minneapolis Star Tribune: Opinion: Here’s why the new Minneapolis body camera policy isn’t clearer about consequences
Minneapolis Star Tribune: Opinion: Here’s why the new Minneapolis body camera policy isn’t clearer about consequences by Adam Belz:
NPR (via KUAR): Baltimore Police Caught Planting Drugs In Body-Cam Footage, Public Defender Says
NPR (via KUAR): Baltimore Police Caught Planting Drugs In Body-Cam Footage, Public Defender Says by Bill Chappell:
If a hit on an LPN scanner is PC for a stop, so is one on a body camera: Naked Security: Police bodycams get tech that can identify “faces and people”
Naked Security: Police bodycams get tech that can identify “faces and people” by Lisa Vaas: Body cameras aimed at Police and other “public safety users” are getting outfitted with new abilities to identify things like stolen bicycles, missing children and … Continue reading
NYTimes: Jurors Find Video Isn’t Providing 20/20 Vision in Police Shootings
NYTimes: Jurors Find Video Isn’t Providing 20/20 Vision in Police Shootings by Julie Bosman, Mitch Smith, and Michael Wines: Since the 2014 shooting death of Michael Brown by a police officer in Ferguson, Mo. – a shooting that was not … Continue reading
IA: Consent valid based on testimony despite bodycam not picking up voices
The bodycam didn’t pick up the officer’s voice, which is “troubling,” but the trial court credited the officers’ testimony defendant consented, and that’s enough to have to affirm on consent. State v. Klinger, 2017 Iowa App. LEXIS 633 (June 21, … Continue reading
AP: Exclusive: Moonlighting police leave body cameras behind
AP: Exclusive: Moonlighting police leave body cameras behind by John Seww:er That’s because most police agencies that make the cameras mandatory for patrol shifts don’t require or won’t allow body cameras for off-duty officers even if they’re working in uniform, … Continue reading
D.Ariz.: Body camera video and audio showed the officer was diligent and not prolonging the stop
“Indeed, as pointed out by the magistrate judge, the ‘body camera video and audio demonstrate that Trooper Duckett was working diligently in trying to locate Ms. Glenn’s license information, but it did take some time to find it.’” Finally, the … Continue reading
WaPo: Opinion: Body cameras are key for police accountability. We can’t let them erode privacy rights
WaPo: Opinion: Body cameras are key for police accountability. We can’t let them erode privacy rights by Chris Dunn and Donna Lieberman: An essential tool poses a core dilemma.