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- 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
- CAAF: SW’s incorporated affidavit satisfied particularity, reliance on CA10 case not CAAF case was error
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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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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)
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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: May 2016
CA9: There is no blanket “domestic violence” exception to Terry’s requirement for particularized suspicion
A domestic violence call doesn’t per se mean there is reasonable suspicion. The circumstances of the call have to be evaluated on arrival at the scene from all the circumstances. Thomas v. Dillard, 2016 U.S. App. LEXIS 8679 (9th Cir. … Continue reading
N.D.Iowa: Inventory “policy’s language that the inventory must be ‘thorough and uniform’” is not “unconstitutional per se”
An inventory “policy’s language that the inventory must be ‘thorough and uniform’” is not “unconstitutional per se.” United States v. Perez-Trevino, 2016 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 61447 (N.D.Iowa May 10, 2016)*:
PA: Def didn’t show his room was exclusive to prevent probation search of father’s house
Defendant lived with his girlfriend in his father’s home and father was on probation. During a probation search of the house, defendant said that their bedroom was exclusively theirs and the officers couldn’t enter. The record does not support that … Continue reading
TX14: Dog sniff at apartment door was curtilage and violated Jardines
The use of a drug dog at defendant’s apartment door violated the Fourth Amendment. Defendant’s garage across the road is a different matter, but it doesn’t have to be decided. Officers showed PC for a search of defendant’s garage in … Continue reading
NC: Nervousness and having associated with a known drug dealer was not RS
Nervousness and having associated with a known drug dealer was not reasonable suspicion for continuing a stop. State v. Bedient, 2016 N.C. App. LEXIS 506 (May 3, 2016). Defense counsel’s affidavit in his 2255 showed that defendant didn’t want to … Continue reading
CA6: Officer’s unprovoked attack on ptf for shutting his door on uninvited officer was excessive
The officer’s unprovoked attack on the plaintiff for shutting his door on police officers not invited in was excessive force under the Fourth Amendment. “There was no need for any force in this situation because no crime was being committed … Continue reading
TN: Driver slumped over wheel of running car justified opening the door
Defendant was seen parked in front of a store slumped over the steering wheel. The community caretaking function permitted officers to open the door to check on him. The community caretaking function isn’t limited to consensual encounters. State v. McCormick, … Continue reading
SecurityInfoWatch: Officials calling for tweaks to security protocol
SecurityInfoWatch: Officials calling for tweaks to security protocol by William L. Spence: May 11–WASHINGTON, DC — Privacy and civil liberty advocates say a “vital” surveillance program that has helped identify terrorists and thwart attacks should be modified to ensure greater … Continue reading
Inc.com: Why Your Fingerprint Isn’t Protected by the Constitution
Inc.com: Why Your Fingerprint Isn’t Protected by the Constitution by Will Kakowicz: You are protected against revealing passwords under the Fifth Amendment’s right against self-incrimination, but your biometrics are not.
OH4: No reasonable expectation from a snitch coming into one’s home and recording a drug sale
There is no reasonable expectation from a snitch coming into one’s home and recording a drug sale. By letting the snitch in, defendant assumed the risk. State v. Taylor, 2016-Ohio-2781, 2016 Ohio App. LEXIS 1644 (4th Dist. April 27, 2016). … Continue reading
HuffPo: Here’s A Good Reason For The Fourth Amendment To Apply To Immigration Courts
HuffPo: Here’s A Good Reason For The Fourth Amendment To Apply To Immigration Courts by Roque Planas: “They would spare a lot of people a lot of hurt if they would apply the law the way they’re supposed to,” says … Continue reading
Boston NPR: GPS Is Everywhere, Is That A Good Thing?
Boston NPR: GPS Is Everywhere, Is That A Good Thing? Here and Now, “Jeremy Hobson talks with Greg Milner about some of the security concerns that have come up involving GPS.”
I’m behind because of a jury trial this week
Rolling Stone: Why America Can’t Quit the Drug War
Rolling Stone: Why America Can’t Quit the Drug War by Tim Dickinson: After 45 years, more than $1 trillion wasted, and the creation of the world’s largest prison system, America still lacks the political will to change its failed drug … Continue reading
Android Central: Your privacy, your fingerprints and the fifth amendment
Android Central: Your privacy, your fingerprints and the fifth amendment by Jerry Hildenbrand: You can be forced to provide your fingerprint to access the data on your phone. But you don’t have to make it easy.
The Hill: Let’s close the email privacy loophole now
The Hill: Let’s close the email privacy loophole now by Patrick Leahy & Mike Lee: This week the House of Representatives took an historic step for Americans’ privacy rights. By an overwhelming vote of 419-0, it passed bipartisan legislation to … Continue reading
VA: Military base parking pass on rear view mirror justified traffic stop
An “opaque plastic parking pass for a nearby military facility, approximately 3″ by 5″ in size, suspended from the rear-view mirror mounting” was sufficiently obstructive of the driver’s view to justify a traffic stop. Mason v. Commonwealth, 2016 Va. LEXIS … Continue reading
AZ somehow finds RS from flight of “dangerous” companion to defendant doing nothing
Defendant was in a high crime area and his suspected “dangerous” companions fled. That left him doing nothing and he got frisked. Somehow, this is reasonable suspicion. State v. Primous, 2016 Ariz. App. LEXIS 77 (May 5, 2016). And this … Continue reading