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- WaPo: Americans have turned against police cameras that track license plates, new survey shows
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- D.Me.: Yes, more investigation could have been done, but there’s still PC on what there was
- CA3: Brady doesn’t apply to SW materials
- E.D.Mich.: Person a cell phone was given to as gift could consent to search
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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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To search Search and Seizure on Lexis.com $ -
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FBI Domestic Investigations and Operations Guide (2008) (pdf)
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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)
--Federal Laws Relating to Cybersecurity: Discussion of Proposed Revisions (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. 
Monthly Archives: July 2014
IA rejects SCOTUS probation and parole search exception on state constitution
On state constitutional grounds, Iowa refuses to follow SCOTUS on probation and parole searches. A search warrant is required without consent. “For the above reasons, we think Cullison remains good law. We decline to overrule it. The United States Supreme … Continue reading
AZ: Open door in area known for string of burglaries justified entry
Officers came to defendant’s house looking for somebody else as a suspect because of a significant number of home burglaries in the area. They found a gate, a 120′ driveway, and opened the gate. About 15′ in they noticed that … Continue reading
CA11: Defendant lacked standing on the curtilage of a house he was often a guest in when he was fleeing police and stopped in front yard
Defendant was riding a bicycle on the wrong side of the street, and the police recognized him from prior investigations, so they followed and attempted to stop him. He pedelled faster and went to house and entered a gate to … Continue reading
Two large records searches, not overbroad when read with the attachments
Defendant was lawyer involved in a fraud, and the court of appeals finds that his office was “permeated with fraud” such that a broad records search was permitted. Attachment A to the warrant limited discretion, and he contended it was … Continue reading
SC: Open container conviction wasn’t collateral estoppel to cocaine possession filed in different court from the same stop
Defendant was charged in municipal court with an open container and was convicted after trial. He was also charged in circuit court with crack possession, and the state argued offensive collateral estoppel from losing the prior search claim. The court … Continue reading
D.Del.: Passenger lacked standing to contest placement of GPS, aside from the fact it was before Jones
Defendant as a passenger lacked standing in the GPS placement on another’s vehicle before Jones, never even having to discuss Davis good faith. United States v. Cabrera, 2014 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 96288 (D. Del. July 16, 2014).* Defendant’s overbreadth challenge … Continue reading
OH10: No REP in IP subscriber information under OH Constitution
There is no reasonable expectation of privacy in IP subscriber information under the Ohio Constitution. Other Ohio courts and other state courts have so held. [In fact, no other court disagrees yet.] State v. Fielding, 2014-Ohio-3105, 2014 Ohio App. LEXIS … Continue reading
CA11: No exigency present on a domestic call to justify warrantless entry into home
No reasonable officer could conclude on these facts that there was exigency for a warrantless entry. There was no evidence that actual violence was occurring or threatened. Therefore, qualified immunity was denied. Walters v. Freeman, 2014 U.S. App. LEXIS 13540 … Continue reading
WaPo: Radley Balko: Cops caught improperly seizing cars, then selling them off the books
WaPo: Radley Balko: Cops caught improperly seizing cars, then selling them off the books: Small-town cops caught improperly seizing cars for minor traffic violations, then selling them to junkyards. Most of the transactions were off the books, and a lot … Continue reading
WI: Mistake of law on how many taillights have to work led to suppression
One unlit bulb in a taillight system that was otherwise visible 500′ was unreasonable. This is a mistake of law. State v. Brown, 2014 WI 69, 2014 Wisc. LEXIS 483 (July 16, 2014). Driving 25 then 20 in a 50 … Continue reading
WaPo: Op-ed: Meet Executive Order 12333: The Reagan rule that lets the NSA spy on Americans
WaPo: Op-ed: Meet Executive Order 12333: The Reagan rule that lets the NSA spy on Americans by John Napier Tye: Public debate about the bulk collection of U.S. citizens’ data by the NSA has focused largely on Section 215 of … Continue reading
BLT: Debating the Efficacy of NSA Surveillance Oversight
BLT: Debating the Efficacy of NSA Surveillance Oversight by Andrew Ramonas: The question of whether the oversight of the federal government’s surveillance activities is effective came to a head on Capitol Hill on Friday as former National Security Agency general … Continue reading
Politico: Hill surveillance reform: Time is not on its side
Politico: Hill surveillance reform: Time is not on its side by Alex Byers: Privacy advocates disagree over how best to end the government’s bulk phone records program.
IA: Ex parte order to drug test a parent in custody case was unreasonable
An ex parte order to compel a parent in a custody case to be drug tested was unreasonable. In the Interest of A.C., 2014 Iowa App. LEXIS 731 (July 16, 2014): In sum, we find no statutory authority to support … Continue reading
E.D.Wis.: Officers are not required to doubt what they see in determining apparent authority to consent
The consenter called 911 to say that her live-in boyfriend locked her out of the house and battered her. When they arrived, she was back in, and her children were there, along with her and clothes and kids’ toys. Based … Continue reading
USPS mail imaging helps solve ricin mailing case
Ark. Democrat-Gazette: Texas ricin mailer sentenced to 18 years by Chad Day (sub. req.) Three letters were mailed to President Obama, NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg, and a gun control advocate by former actress Shannon Guess Richardson. Only the latter was … Continue reading
OH9: Mistake of law on where car needed to stop justified suppressing the stop
Officer’s mistake of law that a driver had to stop only at a stop line and not before made the stop unreasonable. State v. Drushal, 2014-Ohio-3088, 2014 Ohio App. LEXIS 3020 (9th Dist. July 14, 2014).* [Will Heien v. North … Continue reading