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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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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 2015
NYTimes: Some New York Police Street Stops Are Going Undocumented, Report Says
NYTimes: Some New York Police Street Stops Are Going Undocumented, Report Says by J. David Goodman and Al Baker: Some New York City police officers are stopping people for questioning but not documenting the encounters as required, calling into question … Continue reading
NYTimes: The Illusion of a Liberal Supreme Court
NYTimes: The Illusion of a Liberal Supreme Court by Linda Greenhouse: For one, brief shining moment — that is to say, last week — there was a liberal Roberts court.
USA Today: New privacy debate focuses on government access to emails, texts, calls
USA Today: New privacy debate focuses on government access to emails, texts, calls by Erin Kelly: Now that Congress has ended the National Security Agency’s controversial dragnet of Americans’ phone records, privacy advocates are pushing to curb a lesser-known surveillance … Continue reading
WaPo: Los Angeles v. Patel and the constitutional structure of judicial review
WaPo: Los Angeles v. Patel and the constitutional structure of judicial review by Nicholas Quinn Rosenkranz: Lost in the shuffle of Supreme Court commentary last week was Los Angeles v. Patel, a case that is ostensibly about unreasonable searches under … Continue reading
WaPo: Radley Balko’s ‘The Watch’ Blog: Documents show excessive use of Massachusetts SWAT teams
WaPo: Radley Balko’s ‘The Watch’ Blog: Documents show excessive use of Massachusetts SWAT teams: SWAT teams were once used only in emergency situations, when lives were in immediate danger. That is, they were primarily used to protect civilians. Today, they’re … Continue reading
W.D.Va.: Def consented but withdrew it; search unreasonable
Despite defendant’s claim that he didn’t speak much English at all, being Russian speaking Ukranian, the court finds consent valid based on gestures on the video where his voice was largely inaudible. However, he clearly withdrew consent and told the … Continue reading
IN: Car’s GPS device protected under Riley; SW required
A vehicle’s GPS device is not a container subject to search under the automobile exception. It contains personal data, and it is akin to a cell phone, and a warrant is required under Riley. Wertz v. State, 2015 Ind. App. … Continue reading
OH11: Quarles public safety exception for firearms did not apply where def no threat
The Quarles public safety exception for firearms did not permit a search of defendant’s car for a gun. He was outside his car, said he had a conceal carry permit and the gun was in the console, and officers searched … Continue reading
HuffPo: Predicting Predictive Policing in NYC
HuffPo: Predicting Predictive Policing in NYC by Andrew Guthrie Ferguson: One year ago — almost to the day — I predicted that the New York Police Department (NYPD) would adopt predictive policing technologies to shift focus away from the challenged … Continue reading
USA Today: New privacy debate focuses on government access to emails, texts, calls
USA Today: New privacy debate focuses on government access to emails, texts, calls by Erin Kelly: WASHINGTON — Now that Congress has ended the National Security Agency’s controversial dragnet of Americans’ phone records, privacy advocates are pushing to curb a … Continue reading
The Hill: The SEC’s curious view of the Constitution and privacy rights
The Hill: The SEC’s curious view of the Constitution and privacy rights by Lou Mejia:
IN: You can walk off from an officer talking to you where no RS
Defendant could not be convicted of resisting a law enforcement officer by walking off when the officer wanted to talk to him, absent reasonable suspicion. [But it kind of sounds like reasonable suspicion in the opinion.] Jones v. State, 2015 … Continue reading
S.D.Ga.: Search incident of car valid where def on ground being searched when officers looked for gun
Defendant was wanted for a recent shooting with a shotgun, and the USM fugitive squad was in on the manhunt. When they found him, they stopped the car and had him on the ground next to the car with the … Continue reading
ID: Def’s purse was in car at time of dog alert, so it was subject to search under automobile exception
Defendant’s purse was in her vehicle when a dog alerted on it. By the time the police were going to search her car, the purse was in her hands. The purse could be searched under the automobile exception because it … Continue reading
M.D.Ga.: DNA taken under state law that was potentially purgable still could be used as evidence in a federal prosecution
Defendant was charged as a first offender under Georgia law, and, if he completed probation successfully, his DNA sample would have been purged from the system. Here, the DNA was matched to another crime when he was still on probation. … Continue reading
N.D.Ill.: There is no REP in the information provided by a “smart meter” to the power grid
Plaintiff organization sued the City over its “smart meters” that were installed through a Dept. of Energy grant to modernize the power grid. The meters provide realtime information about power usage in a home. The court denies a Third Amended … Continue reading
D.Md.: McNeely doesn’t require a warrant for a breath test
Under the federal implied consent law, defendant consented to a BAC breath test. McNeely doesn’t require a warrant before a breath test. “Although a driver has a constitutional right not to be tested without a warrant or a valid warrant … Continue reading
Legal Intelligencer: The USA Freedom Act and Fourth Amendment Jurisprudence
Legal Intelligencer: The USA Freedom Act and Fourth Amendment Jurisprudence by Leonard Deutchman: