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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
D.S.D.: Def’s REP in a mailed letter ended when it was opened on receipt
Defendant’s expectation of privacy in letter he mailed ended when it was received and opened. The USMJ did not abuse his discretion in not reopening the suppression hearing to ask further questions about photographs. The suppression hearing was three days … Continue reading
W.D.Mo.: Reaching in def’s door to grab him and pull him out to arrest was based on PC and exigency of threat of violence
Officers received a call about defendant having a sawed off shotgun and pointing it at somebody. They had enough information to be probable cause. They went to defendant’s house to arrest, and defendant came to the door but wouldn’t come … Continue reading
HuffPo: Will the Coming ‘Internet of Things’ Mean the Death of Privacy?
HuffPo: Will the Coming ‘Internet of Things’ Mean the Death of Privacy? by Vivek Wadhwa:
W.D.Va.: Def made a colorable claim that his indictment was based on an illegal search, so he gets early discovery of GJ materials
Defendant made a colorable claim that his indictment was based on an illegal search. Therefore, he is entitled to early discovery of the grand jury transcripts in an effort to prove that despite Calandra. United States v. Patiutka, 2015 U.S. … Continue reading
CA3: Def was stopped, and without reasonable suspicion, as officers advanced on him; the fact he took two steps back was still submission
There was no reasonable suspicion for defendant’s stop. The fact he backed up a couple of steps as officers advanced on him was not flight. “In sum, we hold that Lowe submitted to the officers’ authority by staying put in … Continue reading
CA7: Backpack search for a weapon wasn’t justified; govt’s alternative theory was waived below
The search of defendant’s backpack wasn’t justified under any legal theory because there was neither probable cause nor reasonable suspicion for the detention. He and his companion were handcuffed behind their backs, and officer safety was no longer an issue. … Continue reading
NYTimes Editorial: The Activist Roberts Court, 10 Years In
NYTimes Editorial: The Activist Roberts Court, 10 Years In: What is the most useful way to understand the direction of the Supreme Court 10 years into the tenure of Chief Justice John Roberts Jr.? After a series of high-profile end-of-term … Continue reading
MS: Rental inspection warrant ordinance unconstitutional for no PC requirement
Madison’s rental inspection warrant system violates the Fourth Amendment because the ordinance does not require that the warrant issue on probable cause of a potential violation. Crook v. City of Madison, 2015 Miss. LEXIS 352 (July 2, 2015):
S.D.W.Va.: Lost warrant could be proved by unexecuted copies from the officer’s file
The affidavit and search warrant were lost, but they could be recreated by unexecuted copies from the officer’s file and the associated materials used with them, such as the criminal complaint which used the same information. United States v. Richardson, … Continue reading
E.D.N.Y.: Bootstrapping a minor offense into a search incident is generally unreasonable, but govt met its burden here
Defendant was seen tossing a green beer bottle and officers attempted to step in front of him to stop him to inquire into the littering. Instead of talking to them, he pushed past them, and that made them concerned he … Continue reading
OH10: Asking for DL of driver of parked car was a stop of everybody in the car
Defendant was in a parked car with others when the police pulled up. It became a stop of everybody in the car under Brendlin when the officer asked for ID, and there was no reasonable suspicion of any crime whatsoever. … Continue reading
E.D.Pa.: Def gets return of property seized 7½ years ago
Defendant is entitled to return of property originally seized 7½ years ago to prosecute him that is not contraband and no longer needed. United States v. Green, 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 85174 (E.D.Pa. June 30, 2015). A state law enforcement … Continue reading
NYTimes: What Did Lincoln Really Think of Jefferson?
NYTimes: What Did Lincoln Really Think of Jefferson? by Allen C. Guelzo: “Mr. Lincoln hated Thomas Jefferson as a man,” wrote William Henry Herndon, Lincoln’s law partner of 14 years — and “as a politician.” Especially after Lincoln read Theodore … Continue reading
TX8: No REP in a high school coach’s half-time speech to his team
It was not a crime under the state wiretap statute for an interloper to record a visiting high school football coach’s half time speech to his team because there was no reasonable expectation of privacy. “The issue in this case … Continue reading
MA: Def’s statement during allegedly illegal entry into his house was spontaneous and attenuated
Police turned a snitch who said he just bought cocaine from defendant. Police determined defendant was on probation and had a prior federal trafficking conviction. They lured him out of the house, and they entered for a sweep. Even if … Continue reading
WaPo editorial: The Declaration’s dual traditions: Broad equality, and equality for whites
WaPo editorial: The Declaration’s dual traditions: Broad equality, and equality for whites by Danielle Allen: This Fourth of July, like the preceding weeks, will be painful, following the Charleston massacre — a devastating example of the lofty ideal of human … Continue reading
WaPo: These videos of a Texas police shooting show how body cameras can vindicate good cops
WaPo: These videos of a Texas police shooting show how body cameras can vindicate good cops by Radley Balko: The two disturbing videos below depict the fatal police shooting of James Bushey, 47, of Elkhart, Tex. The videos are taken … Continue reading