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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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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)
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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, 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: December 2016
M.D.Pa.: Def can have limited discovery about the search but not a prior draft of the affidavit
Defendant’s discovery request relating to the execution of search warrants on his property is granted in part and denied in part. Essentially, he gets that which is really relevant like a video of execution of the warrant, chain of custody … Continue reading
NY Co.Ct.: Animal in “distress” justified entry into side yard from which marijuana plant could be seen in back yard
911 received an animal control call, and the officer went to defendant’s house and in the side yard were dogs that had no water but food and the yard was full of dog feces. The dogs were barking and acted … Continue reading
SCOTUS cert grant: County of Los Angeles v. Mendez: excessive force
SCOTUS grants cert in County of Los Angeles v. Mendez, 16-639, cert. pet. here, granting on questions 1 and 3. Questions presented: In a 42 U.S.C. § 1983 action, the district court concluded Los Angeles County Sheriffs Department (“LASD”) deputies … Continue reading
Two on community caretaking stops: one valid, one not
A convenience store operator called the police to say that a woman was stuck under a BMW in the parking lot. By the time the officer arrived, the car had left so he followed it observing no erratic driving or … Continue reading
N.D.Ohio: Def’s going home after a drug deal shows nexus for SW for house
“Here, the affidavit provides that the confidential informant had been providing information to the task force for 11 months, he had no criminal convictions, and his information has never been found to be false or misleading. (Aff. ¶ 13.) This, … Continue reading
D.Kan.: Protective sweep is different from search incident; search of trunk was excessive as a protective sweep
A protective sweep is different from a search incident and they are founded on different precepts. The search of the car interior was valid as a protective sweep, but the trunk was not. United States v. Cooks, 2016 U.S. Dist. … Continue reading
Police One: What cops need to know about blood alcohol testing and the Fourth Amendment
Police One: What cops need to know about blood alcohol testing and the Fourth Amendment by Terrence P. Dwyer: Make sure you’re current on your state’s driving while intoxicated and implied consent laws Driving while intoxicated is a serious offense … Continue reading
Police One: How license plate readers are helping one California PD catch more criminals [a paid ad on PoliceOne.com by the seller]
Police One: How license plate readers are helping one California PD catch more criminals by PoliceOne BrandFocus Staff Police in La Verne use fixed LPR cameras to create a virtual fence around the city The following is paid content sponsored … Continue reading
WaPo: The culture around Trump and the troubling message to police
WaPo: The culture around Trump and the troubling message to police by Steven Hale: Over the past several years there has been much discussion about police culture and how, in some cases, it might contribute to the disturbing incidents we … Continue reading
TX6: Two TX DFPS workers’ convictions for “official oppression” for knowingly conducting illegal searches affirmed
This defendant was employed by the Greenville office of the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services. A.K., a 15 year runaway, was captured and taken to juvenile detention. “On A.K.’s arrival, the center’s personnel took A.K.’s personal effects, including … Continue reading
Rule 41 change effective: NPR: Judges Have More Power In Granting Warrants To Hack Digital Devices / Some questions for Jeff Sessions
NPR: Judges Have More Power In Granting Warrants To Hack Digital Devices by David Welna Under new rules, the Justice Department can ask a federal court for permission to search mobile devices outside the court’s district. Congress had a full … Continue reading
CA7: Where there already was PC for def’s arrest warrant, the use of a Stingray to find him didn’t violate any 4A rights
Officers had a warrant for defendant’s arrest for a state parole violation, and they found him in a public place and arrested him. They used a Stingray device to locate him rather than rely on the cell phone company to … Continue reading
S.D.Cal.: Cell phone could be searched at border on finding of cocaine in car
Finding 16.52 kg of cocaine in a car at the border was probable cause, and seizure of the defendant’s cell phone was proper. Therefore, it did not matter whether or not the cell phone was “forensically” searched or “cursorily” searched … Continue reading