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- D.N.M.: DEA’s failure to make a detailed inventory in violation of policy doesn’t require exclusion of evidence
- WaPo: These cities bar facial recognition tech. Police still found ways to access it.
- C.D.Cal.: SW materials in case with weighty public interest ordered unsealed
- DC: Accepting a law license is consent to trust account subpoenas
- AR: RS def rented a hotel room was sufficient for search waiver; PC not required
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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)
--Federal Statutes Governing Wiretapping and Electronic Eavesdropping (2012)
--Federal Laws Relating to Cybersecurity: Discussion of Proposed Revisions (2012)
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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) -
“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)
Website design by Wally Waller, Little Rock 
Monthly Archives: July 2015
Chicago Tribune: When cops ignore the law
Chicago Tribune: When cops ignore the law by Steve Chapman: The lesson imprinted by the experience was one I already understood, even if I had never thought much about it: Some of the scariest people are the ones who are … Continue reading
WaPo: Radley Balko’s ‘The Watch’ Blog: So much for the “Ferguson effect”: Killings of cops are down 25 percent for the first half of 2015
WaPo: Radley Balko’s ‘The Watch’ Blog: So much for the “Ferguson effect”: Killings of cops are down 25 percent for the first half of 2015: Through the end of June, the number of officers killed by gunfire has dropped 25 … Continue reading
ars technica: LAPD cop gets 3 years in jail for beating suspect caught on dashcam
ars technica: LAPD cop gets 3 years in jail for beating suspect caught on dashcam by David Kravets: A Los Angeles Police Department 18-year veteran was handed a three-year jail term Thursday, six weeks after being found guilty of striking … Continue reading
Newsweek: U.S. Customs and Border Protection Weighs Using Body Cameras
Newsweek: U.S. Customs and Border Protection Weighs Using Body Cameras by Victoria Bekiempis: U.S. Customs and Border Protection could decide whether to have its officers and agents use body-worn cameras by the end of 2015, said CBP Assistant Chief Donna … Continue reading
AZ: The smell of burnt marijuana in a car may be PC; burden on def to show MMJ card
Arizona’s First District Court of Appeals distinguishes Sisco from the Second District from four days earlier: The smell of burnt marijuana in a car is different, and the burden is on the defendant to show he’s a MMJ user. State … Continue reading
CA1: Gaming machines outside casinos also highly regulated industry by state law
Gaming machines outside casinos in Puerto Rico, Adult Entertainment Machines, are within a scheme of highly regulated businesses, as is gambling there in general, for the purposes of Burger. Therefore, the Commonwealth was within its power to inspect and seize … Continue reading
CA10: Not clearly established that confiscating weapons from a potential suicide even after he was removed to the hospital was unreasonable
It was not clearly established that confiscating weapons from a potential suicide even after he was removed to the hospital was unreasonable in 2010. Arden v. McIntosh, 2015 U.S. App. LEXIS 12725 (10th Cir. July 23, 2015):
NH: State failed to prove basics of protective sweep here
The state neither preserved nor proved that a protective sweep was required of this house. They claimed to be looking for a “cohort” of defendant who was possibly there, but there was no indication that this person was violent or … Continue reading
Just Security: Are Cross-Border Shootings Heading to the Supreme Court?
Just Security: Are Cross-Border Shootings Heading to the Supreme Court? by Steve Vladeck: Two weeks ago, I wrote about an important new decision by the US District Court for the District of Arizona, holding that the Fourth Amendment does apply … Continue reading
W.D.Tex.: Lack of an arrest warrant does not mean they didn’t have probable cause
Officers had probable cause to arrest defendant for child pornography before the search warrant was executed on his place. The lack of an arrest warrant does not mean they didn’t have probable cause. United States v. Ruiz, 2014 U.S. Dist. … Continue reading
Policy Mic: Arizona Drug Tested Welfare Recipients — Here Are the Shocking Results [1 positive in 87,000 tests]
Policy Mic: Arizona Drug Tested Welfare Recipients — Here Are the Shocking Results by Gregory Krieg: When Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker announced his candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination on July 13, he peppered his 34-minute speech with a laundry … Continue reading
Techdirt: Police Cameras Are Valuable… But Not If They Can Alter The Videos
Techdirt: Police Cameras Are Valuable… But Not If They Can Alter The Videos by Mike Masnick: We’ve talked plenty about the value of body cameras and dashcams for police — in acting as a deterrent to bad behavior by police … Continue reading
WaPo: The law of the Sandra Bland traffic stop
WaPo: The law of the Sandra Bland traffic stop by Orin Kerr: I’ve been asked a lot about the law of the Sandra Bland traffic stop, and in particular whether Bland had to put out her cigarette and get out … Continue reading
SCOTUSBlog: Criminal law grants for the October Term 2015
SCOTUSBlog: Criminal law grants for the October Term 2015 by Rory Little: The other interesting note is that, so far, not a single case granted for next Term involves the Fourth Amendment. I can’t recall a prior Term where that … Continue reading
CNN: What are your rights during a traffic stop?
CNN: What are your rights during a traffic stop? (Video)
techdirt: NJ Legislators Want To Ban Drone Photography Of ‘Critical Infrastructure’
techdirt: NJ Legislators Want To Ban Drone Photography Of ‘Critical Infrastructure’: Government paranoia about “critical infrastructure” will now be extended to drone photography, if New Jersey’s proposed legislation is any indication. While law enforcement agencies are still weighing the Fourth … Continue reading
NE: A stop merely to gather information about a week-old crime was unreasonable
Defendant was stopped to gather information from him about something he allegedly witnessed a week earlier, and he ended up getting arrested for DUI. Lidster and other roadblock cases are discussed, and they don’t apply. The information gathering stop was … Continue reading