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ABA Journal Web 100, Best Law Blogs (2017); ABA Journal Blawg 100 (2015-16)
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© 2003-19,
online since Feb. 24, 2003
WebPage Visits: real non-robot hits since 2010; approx. 25k posts since 2003~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Fourth Amendment cases,
citations, and linksLatest Slip Opinions:
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To search Search and Seizure on Lexis.com $Research Links:
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Federal Law Enforcement Training Center Resources
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Stringrays (ACLU No. Cal.) (pdf)
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
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NACDL’s Domestic Drone Information Center
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Section 1983 Blog"If it was easy, everybody would be doing it. It isn't, and they don't."
—Me“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"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!”
"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."
---Pepé Le Pew
—Johnson v. United States, 333 U.S. 10, 13-14 (1948)
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Category Archives: Anticipatory warrant
WVVA: After crackdown on pill mills, more drugs being seized by mail
WVVA: After crackdown on pill mills, more drugs being seized by mail [this what we’ve all noticed for years]:
D.Mont.: Destruction of a lockbox to search it was not unreasonable
Damaging a lockbox to open it under a search warrant was not unreasonable and doesn’t require suppression of its contents. Destruction of property is sometimes required to execute a search warrant: Dalia v. United States. United States v. Boeke, 2019 … Continue reading
CA8: Package with anticipatory SW was placed back on porch with “return to sender” on it; search still constitutionally sufficient
In this anticipatory warrant case, the package was received, but it was placed back outside with “return to sender” written on it. Still, the warrant was constitutionally sufficient and the officers supplying their own triggering event, one not provided for … Continue reading
S.D.N.Y.: Govt fails its burden of proof to show RS for a stop and frisk based on credibility of the officer; it was a hunch at best
Defendant was seen at 1 am in a high crime area on the street in the Bronx talking with three others. The officer claimed he could see him adjusting his waistband, suggesting a gun. Collectively, the court simply doesn’t believe … Continue reading
E.D.Mo.: PC shown for def’s CSLI at time of murder
The affidavit for search warrant for CSLI for defendant’s phone was issued with probable cause. Defendant’s phone allegedly talked to the murder victim shortly before the murder, and it was reasonable to attempt to determine where the defendant’s phone was … Continue reading
D.Nev.: The fact the officers claimed to smell marijuana but didn’t find any doesn’t mean they were lying
It was testified that the car smelled like burnt marijuana. The fact none was found doesn’t indicate that officers were lying. United States v. Davila, 2019 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 42805 (D. Nev. Jan. 31, 2019),* adopted, 2019 U.S. Dist. LEXIS … Continue reading
D.D.C.: Officers’ testimony about smell of PCP was too equivocal to be reliable
The officers’ testimony about allegedly smelling PCP when they stopped defendant was too equivocal through the hearing to be reliable. A patdown of defendant off that alleged smell produced a gun in his pocket. Defendant’s alleged consent to the patdown … Continue reading
CA6: SW’s flexibility as to when it could be executed didn’t make it an anticipatory warrant with a triggering condition
The search warrant reasonably provided flexibility as to when it would be executed, but it was not an anticipatory warrant at all. United States v. Huntley, 2018 U.S. App. LEXIS 20956 (6th Cir. July 30, 2018):
KS: Warning officers about self-incrimination at suppression hearing deterrent enough; no exclusion
Kansas police officers can go outside their jurisdiction when requested to do so. Kansas statute implies an exclusionary remedy. Here, the officers appear to have violated the statute, but the district court warned the officers against self-incrimination at the hearing … Continue reading
M.D.Tenn.: Even if Karo didn’t permit monitoring a tracker on a package brought into the house, there was PC anyway
Even if Karo required excising or excluding the statement in the affidavit for search warrant that the package was in the target residence for the anticipatory warrant, there was probable cause without it, so it doesn’t matter. United States v. … Continue reading
CA6: When an anticipatory SW says delivery to X, X has to receive it for search to occur
When the triggering event in an anticipatory search warrant doesn’t occur, then the search can’t occur. Here it was to a named person. Somebody else accepting it isn’t acceptable. “In this case, requiring delivery to Perkins is the only common … Continue reading
OH8: No standing in a package neither sent nor to be received by def
Defendant lacked standing to challenge the placing of the GPS tracking device on the package because she was neither the sender nor addressee of the package and demonstrated no reasonable expectation of privacy in the package. The police could validly … Continue reading
