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Recent Posts
- CA11: Service of SW without attachments isn’t 4A violation
- KS: Running warrants on a passed out person is reasonable
- M.D.Fla.: Unidentified pills in driver’s lap may have been RS but it wasn’t PC for arrest
- D.C.Cir.: It was reasonable for officers to conclude that evidence or instrumentalities of the crime would be found in the car used in a robbery
- CA7: Officer’s warrantless view of CSAM flagged by hash value was not unreasonable
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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)
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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: June 2017
KS: State’s failure to prove the inventory policy was fatal to the inventory search
State’s failure to prove the inventory policy was fatal to the inventory search. State v. Baker, 2017 Kan. LEXIS 310 (June 9, 2017):
W.D.Ky.: SW for premises permits search of any vehicle parked on the property
The search warrant for the house in this case permitted a search of any vehicles on the premises, not just those belonging to the owner of the residence. In any event, the good faith exception applies. United States v. Keeling, … Continue reading
M.D.Pa.: Def’s matching citizen informant’s description and location was RS, and his flight was PC
The detailed description given by a 911 calling citizen informant was reasonable suspicion when defendant was seen matching the description. When police approached him, defendant ran, and that was probable cause. United States v. King, 2017 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 88514 … Continue reading
D.Ariz.: Lifting the tarp off a parked car was reasonable as a protective sweep
Lifting the tarp off a parked car was reasonable as a protective sweep. The officer did not search the car – he only looked in it to make sure no one was hiding there. Defendant’s wife permitted entry into the … Continue reading
AP: Exclusive: Moonlighting police leave body cameras behind
AP: Exclusive: Moonlighting police leave body cameras behind by John Seww:er That’s because most police agencies that make the cameras mandatory for patrol shifts don’t require or won’t allow body cameras for off-duty officers even if they’re working in uniform, … Continue reading
Chicago Reporter: Police misconduct payouts continue to break the bank in Chicago
Chicago Reporter: Police misconduct payouts continue to break the bank in Chicago by Jonah Newman: In its final report last April, the task force criticized the city’s police oversight bodies for failing to analyze these lawsuits for trends or patterns, … Continue reading
NC: Warrantless blood draw from unconscious driver violated 4A
“We now address the application of the Supreme Court’s decisions in Birchfield v. North Dakota and Missouri v. McNeely to the situation at bar, specifically, the warrantless blood draw from defendant for purposes of determining blood alcohol content. We hold … Continue reading
ND: Separate state constitutional search argument has to be developed to be considered
Appellant’s “unconstitutional condition” argument under the Fourth Amendment has already been rejected in this case, and the state consitutitonal argument wasn’t developed. Marman v. Levi, 2017 ND 133, 2017 N.D. LEXIS 133 (June 7, 2017).* Defendant’s untimely motion for new … Continue reading
ND: Drug dog arriving before stop completed could sniff before stop ended
Because the drug dog arrived nearly at the same time as the officer making the traffic stop, the dog sniff on the highway did not extend the stop under Rodriguez. State v. Phelps, 2017 ND 141, 2017 N.D. LEXIS 134 … Continue reading
ND: Method of packaging MJ was sufficient PC for delivery, not just possession
The method of packaging marijuana was probable cause to believe it was for sale and not misdemeanor possession. State v. Turbeville, 2017 ND 139, 2017 N.D. LEXIS 146 (June 9, 2017). The CIs were adequately corroborated in this long term … Continue reading
CA1: 25-year-old prior could be considered by officer in RS totality
Reasonable suspicion was mounting from the beginning of the stop. Defendant was excessively nervous and repeatedly (to the surprise of the officer) consented to a search of the vehicle. Defendant’s 25 year old conviction wasn’t too stale to be considered … Continue reading
CA9: Exigency supported entry into hotel room when there was another child inside in child sex exploitation case
Defense counsel was not ineffective. The search of defendant’s hotel room for evidence in a child sex exploitation case after she escaped from the room and talked to the police was based on exigency. “ The officers also had exigent … Continue reading
CA7: Exclusionary rule won’t be applied to identity in an illegal reentry case
The exclusionary rule won’t be applied to suppress the identity of an undocumented person leading to illegal reentry prosecution (relying on Hudson). United States v. Chagoya-Morales, 2017 U.S. App. LEXIS 10277 (7th Cir. June 9, 2017):
CA8: Warrant was broad, but not constitutionally overbroad for QI under Messerschmidt
An anonymous tip corroborated by a jailhouse telephone call showed probable cause to believe plaintiff was in possession of a pet deer in violation of state game regulations. A search warrant was issued that was broader than just that one … Continue reading
GA: Def’s visiting cousin with no key had no apparent authority to consent to search of house
Defendant’s cousin, visiting the house and working in the garage, had no apparent authority to consent to an entry. He made it clear it wasn’t his house, that he had no key and entered through an unlocked side door, and … Continue reading
IA: “New crime” exception for a crime committed against a police officer after an allegedly unlawful entry is a part of attenuation
The “new crime” exception for a crime committed against a police officer after an allegedly unlawful entry is permitted under the attenuation doctrine. Here, defendant assaulted a police officer who pursued her into her house on a warrant for arrest … Continue reading