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- WaPo: Americans have turned against police cameras that track license plates, new survey shows
- W.D.Tex.: What is the duty of the neutral and detached magistrate?
- 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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General (many free):
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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: August 2014
WaPo: DOJ petitions for rehearing in Eleventh Circuit cell-site case
WaPo: DOJ petitions for rehearing in Eleventh Circuit cell-site case by Orin Kerr: The Justice Department has filed a petition for rehearing en banc in United States v. Davis, the Eleventh Circuit case holding that acquiring historical cell-site data is … Continue reading
NYTimes: Drones Outpacing Rules as Popularity Soars in New York
NYTimes: Drones Outpacing Rules as Popularity Soars in New York by James Barron: Not long ago, drones were a relatively rare sight over New York City, usually piloted by photographers. But now drones are soaring as never before, deployed more … Continue reading
ID: Search of second two cell phones just prior to warrant issuing was inevitable discovery
Defendant had three cell phones and the police had a search warrant for one based on its location because defendant’s rape victim said she believed there was a video of her on the phone. When the others were discovered, other … Continue reading
NYTimes: The Ethicist: Campus Police: Precrime Division
NYTimes: The Ethicist: Campus Police: Precrime Division by Chuck Klosterman: I study computer science at a midsize university, and my school has cameras that cover almost every part of campus. The development of video-processing algorithms that can discern race, height … Continue reading
D.C.Cir.: Female strip search class action denied; a concurrence worth reading
A powerful dissent on the power of government to indiscriminately strip search, post-Florence. Johnson v. Gov’t of the Dist. of Columbia, 2014 U.S. App. LEXIS 14760 (D.C. Cir. August 1, 2014):
NJ: Totality of circumstances test must be applied to warrantless blood draws for BAC
The trial court erred in not applying the totality of circumstances test to McNeely/Schmerber on whether a warrant was required for a blood draw. Reversed. State v. Jones, 2014 N.J. Super. LEXIS 106 (July 29, 2014): The Supreme Court explicitly … Continue reading
New Law Review Article: Failing Expectations: Fourth Amendment Doctrine in the Era of Total Surveillance
New Law Review Article: Failing Expectations: Fourth Amendment Doctrine in the Era of Total Surveillance by Olivier Sylvain, 49 Wake Forest L. Rev. 485 (2014). Abstract: Today’s reasonable expectation test and the third-party doctrine have little to nothing to offer … Continue reading
E.D.Va.: None of four exceptions to warrant requirement supported search of jacket in another room
The search of defendant’s coat in a separate room from him could not be justified under any exception to the warrant requirement: protective sweep, emergency/exigency, Terry frisk, or search incident. Defendant did finally break away from the officers, too, making … Continue reading
CA8: Hour long wait for a drug dog was not unreasonable in rural SD on reasonable suspicion
Once reasonable suspicion arose in a motorist assist, the officer called for drug dog, but the closest was an hour away because they were in rural South Dakota. The detention was still reasonable under all the circumstances despite that delay. … Continue reading
MD: Consent to an earlier DNA draw to exclude didn’t preclude police keeping the DNA on file
Defendant was a homeless man who consented to a DNA draw to exclude him in a rape investigation, which it did. Later, his DNA was tied to a burglary. His consent to the DNA draw included letting them keep it … Continue reading
NYTimes: California Asks: Should Doctors Face Drug Tests?
NYTimes: California Asks: Should Doctors Face Drug Tests? by Adam Nagourney: A battle over a proposal, packed away in a broader initiative meant to raise the financial cap on medical malpractice awards, is being closely watched across the country.
WaPo: Judge orders Microsoft to turn over data held overseas
WaPo: Judge orders Microsoft to turn over data held overseas by Ellen Nakashima:
Law.com/Texas Lawyer: Class Action Alleges Lawyers’ Calls to Inmates Still Recorded, Visitation Option Impacts Income
Law.com/Texas Lawyer: Class Action Alleges Lawyers’ Calls to Inmates Still Recorded, Visitation Option Impacts Income by Angela Morris: “Attorneys’ incomes are reduced if they are forced to rely exclusively on visitation rather than the phone,’ the plaintiffs allege.
NJ: Discussing Navarette, an anonymous 911 call about shots fired from van was RS
Discussing but saying it’s not relying on Navarette, New Jersey holds that an anonymous 911 call about a van from which shots were fired was stopped with reasonable suspicion when it was seen and a protective weapons frisk of the … Continue reading
N.D.Iowa: Strong ether odor big factor in PC for a meth lab
The Eighth Circuit has long held that the odor of ether is a strong factor in probable cause for a methamphetamine lab. Here, the affidavit for the search warrant recounted many other factors in his past drug history. At the … Continue reading
KS: Outgoing prison letters may be searched
A prison inmate’s outgoing letters are not protected by the Fourth Amendment since Stroud (1919). State v. Burnett, 2014 Kan. LEXIS 429 (July 25, 2014) A brief hand-to-hand transaction may have been innocent, but it was enough for a trained … Continue reading