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Recent Posts
- 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
- CAAF: Information on computer stored in evidence room wasn’t stale
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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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Foreign Intell.Surv.Ct.
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To search Search and Seizure on Lexis.com $ -
Research Links:
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General (many free):
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www.fd.org
Federal Law Enforcement Training Center Resources
FBI Domestic Investigations and Operations Guide (2008) (pdf)
DEA Agents Manual (2002) (download)
DOJ Computer Search Manual (2009) (pdf)
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)
ACLU on privacy
Privacy Foundation
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NACDL’s Domestic Drone Information Center
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Criminal Appeal (post-conviction) (9th Cir.)
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)
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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: April 2016
CA9: It was not clearly established at the time that Tasing a noncompliant detainee was excessive
“Responding to a possible domestic violence call, officer Dillard demanded that plaintiff submit to a Terry frisk for a search of weapons. When plaintiff refused to be searched, officer Dillard tased him. The panel held that although the domestic violence … Continue reading
NY: NYC DoC recording jail calls was not as agent of DA; no Sixth Amd. violation
The recording of non-attorney jail calls from Rikers Island and turning them over to the DA’s office does not violate the constitution. Defendant was warned by signs, and thus knew, his calls were being recorded. The NYC Department of Corrections … Continue reading
The Guardian: Stingray ruling could challenge hundreds of Baltimore convictions
The Guardian: Stingray ruling could challenge hundreds of Baltimore convictions by Baynard Woods: Maryland could appeal to supreme court to reverse ruling that found police use of device to track cellphones without warrant in violation of fourth amendment. The Maryland … Continue reading
RI: Stop was pretextual; court doesn’t believe that officer smelled MJ
Defendant’s car was stopped on the RI turnpike for no seatbelts after being noticed at a toll booth. The stop was valid. The officer saw a pill bottle in a mesh holder on the driver’s door, and then he announced … Continue reading
Daily Report: Private Probation Firm Halts Drug Tests Without Court Order
Daily Report: Private Probation Firm Halts Drug Tests Without Court Order by R. Robin McDonald: One of the largest providers of private probation services in Georgia will temporarily stop requiring people on probation to submit to and pay for drug … Continue reading
CADC: Shooting dog that bit through officer’s leather boot wasn’t excessive
DC police did not act unreasonably in shooting a dog named Wrinkles that had bitten a police officer hard enough to puncture leather boots. Even though it was lying down when shot, they couldn’t be certain that the dog did … Continue reading
WaPo: Applying the Fourth Amendment to cell-site simulators
WaPo: Applying the Fourth Amendment to cell-site simulators by Orin Kerr: The widespread use of cellphones gives the government a way to locate criminal suspects using a device known as a cell-site simulator. The Maryland Court of Special Appeals recently … Continue reading
SCOTUS: Strickland’s deference to counsel’s decisions applies to appellate counsel [didn’t we all assume that anyway? Not CA6]
The Strickland “doubly deferential” standard of trial counsel’s failure to challenge a search issue because it would not prevail applies to appellate counsel, too. Woods v. Etherton, 15-723 (U.S. April 4, 2016):
CA1: Merely being primary user of computer doesn’t mean wife didn’t have apparent authority to consent; no separate password
Defendant’s wife saw child pornography on his computer and told the police. She consented to a search of the computer. Even though he was the primary user of the computer, he did not leave the computer password protected from her … Continue reading
OR: Motion to suppress statement does not include suppression of evidence derived from it; have to be explicit
The motion to suppress the statement here did not include a motion to suppress psychical evidence derived from it. “Here, the particular record of this case demonstrates that defendant did not raise the issue regarding the evidence in the backpack … Continue reading
FL5: Passenger can be detained with car; certifying conflict with FL4
“We affirm, and write to consider whether a police officer may, as a matter of course, detain a passenger who attempts to leave the scene of a lawful traffic stop without violating the passenger’s Fourth Amendment rights. … We hold … Continue reading
TX14: State const. affords no broader privacy in CSLI than Fourth Amendment
Defendant was an occasional guest in the house of another. Assuming he had standing, it’s clear that the owner had authority to consent and did consent to a search. Randolph doesn’t require seeking out the defendant to get consent from … Continue reading
W.D.Pa.: Leaving car in street after being taken away by ambulance after being shot justified impoundment and inventory of the car
Defendant called the police because he was shot in the chest while in his car. An ambulance arrived and took defendant to the hospital. His car was left in the middle of the street. Impoundment of the car and inventory … Continue reading
CA6: Separate warrant not required to isolate def in his own house in bathroom to talk to him
Police executed a search warrant and took defendant to the bathroom so they could talk to him about becoming a CI. The detention in the apartment and then the bathroom was justified by the probable cause for this search warrant … Continue reading
The Hill: Groups pressure FBI to disclose how it hacked into shooter’s iPhone
The Hill: Groups pressure FBI to disclose how it hacked into shooter’s iPhone by Katie Bo Williams: Technologists and digital rights activists say it’s a mater of public safety.
CA9: City’s policy on dogs that attacked innocent worker asleep in building keeps city in case
Plaintiff stopped at work after an evening of drinking to sleep on the couch rather than drive home. She got up to pee in the night and accidentally set off the building silent burglar alarm, and she went back to … Continue reading
CA9: Officer’s lie to def about basis for stop isn’t a Fourth Amendment violation
Officers had reasonable suspicion for the traffic stop based on wiretaps. The fact the officer deliberately lied to defendant about the basis of the stop doesn’t violate the Fourth Amendment. United States v. Magallon-Lopez, 2016 U.S. App. LEXIS 5891 (9th … Continue reading