Archives
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Recent Posts
- VA: 12 second question about drugs didn’t unreasonably prolong the stop that was going to take a while anyway
- E.D.Tenn.: Application for SW was considered in detention ruling
- TN: RS didn’t develop to continue stop; second stop based on first suppressed
- CA4: Traffic stop immediately became firearms investigation; suppressed
- CA10: Disagreement over spelling of street name didn’t make warrant fail particularity; GFE at least would apply
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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)
--Federal Laws Relating to Cybersecurity: Discussion of Proposed Revisions (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: September 2017
TN: GFE to warrantless blood draw doesn’t apply to implied consent
The trial court did not err in suppressing the results of the warrantless blood draw performed on defendant because the State failed to show that the blood was drawn pursuant to a recognized exception to the warrant requirement, and implied … Continue reading
D.N.M.: Just because the officer would search again, despite the court’s order the 4A was violated, doesn’t mean he won’t be deterred because he should be
On the government’s motion to reconsider, it argues that the cost-benefits analysis of the exclusionary rule should be evaluated in terms of the fact the officer would have searched here no matter what, so there was nothing to deter. Yes, … Continue reading
M.D.La.: Def claims an illegal search led to his arrest; his admissions on jail phone calls are attenuated from that
Defendant’s calls from jail to his girlfriend about destroying evidence were attenuated from any prior illegality. “The Court finds that the nexus between the original unlawful search and the challenged evidence was attenuated by the intervening phone calls, an independent … Continue reading
E.D.Ky.: Def’s keys under him when arrested were properly seized incident to arrest; testing key in a lock wasn’t a search
Defendant’s keys were on the ground under him when he was arrested face down and handcuffed behind his back. They were seen when he was lifted up to stand. They were seized incident to his arrest, and inserting the key … Continue reading
Lawfare: DreamHost Documents Summaries
Lawfare: DreamHost Documents Summaries by Sarah Tate Chambers & Stephanie Zable:
Fourth Amendment Localism, 93 Ind. L.J. forthcoming
Fourth Amendment Localism, 93 Ind. L.J. forthcoming, Wayne A. Logan (June 2, 2017). Abstract:
Just Security: We Need to Know More About Government Searches of Traveler’s Electronic Devices
Just Security: We Need to Know More About Government Searches of Traveler’s Electronic Devices by Carrie DeCell:
Boston Globe: Should Massachusetts require police to obtain search warrants to use drones for investigations?
Boston Globe: Should Massachusetts require police to obtain search warrants to use drones for investigations? by Bradley H. Jones Jr., Massachusetts House minority leader, North Reading Republican:
CA6: Officer in § 1983 case didn’t show basis for warrantless entry; QI erroneously granted
Crediting the plaintiffs’ complaint and the proof thus far, the defendant officer did not show an excuse for dispensing with the warrant requirement for a warrantless entry into the plaintiffs’ home. Thus, summary judgment on qualified immunity was erroneously granted … Continue reading
OH7: Wooded area behind house was open fields, not curtilage
The area where defendant’s grow operation was found was not curtilage. It was a long distance from the house in a wooded area, and it was in “open fields.” State v. Hambleton, 2017-Ohio-7561, 2017 Ohio App. LEXIS 3876 (7th Dist. … Continue reading
N.D.Ga.: SW for seizure and search of a computer allows the search to be done at a later time
A second search of a computer’s contents is usually justified by the initial search and seizure warrant for the computer. United States v. Perry, 2017 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 148336 (N.D. Ga. Sept. 13, 2017). Officers went to a Biloxi motel … Continue reading
M.D.Pa.: Search under SW not void for failure to leave affidavit in support at scene
There was probable cause for issuance of a search warrant for defendant’s computer for child pornography, which defendant doesn’t contest, except for quibbling over a word in the affidavit about how the officer came upon defendant’s laptop because, even if … Continue reading
TX: Dissent added to Texas’s adopting Davis good faith exception to statutory exclusionary rule
Back in March was this post: Texas finally adopts the Davis good faith exception to its statutory exclusionary rule reporting on McClintock v. State, 2017 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 291 (March 22, 2017). A dissent was just added in McClintock … Continue reading
Cal.4: Probation search of “property, personal effects” reasonably includes a cell phone and its data
A probation search of “property, personal effects” reasonably includes a cell phone and its data. There are no limits on what “personal effects” means in the search condition paperwork. And, this was misdemeanor probation, and the search of the phone … Continue reading
D.Mont.: How many ways can this vehicle search be sustained that go unmentioned?
Defendant was stopped for driving erratically through a construction zone, and when stopped, he was acting strange and officers ordered his hands up. He slowly raised them with a cell phone in hand. Hands on guns, officers approached and saw … Continue reading
OH7: “Appellant acknowledges a hotel employee can consent to law enforcement’s entry into a hotel room if the guest has been evicted.” He was
Defendant was staying at a Comfort Inn, and the hotel quickly concluded defendant was dealing drugs from the room. He didn’t respond to their entries to get out, so they called the police who came to remove him. When defendant … Continue reading
VA: CoA erred in reversing conviction for 4A error where it didn’t contribute to verdict
The Court of Appeals erred in reversing defendant’s conviction because of an alleged Fourth Amendment error where the uncontested evidence demonstrated beyond a reasonable doubt that a rational juror would have found him guilty without the disputed evidence, because that … Continue reading
NLJ: Federal Judge Sues Judicial Conference Over Forced Mental Health Evaluation
NLJ: Federal Judge Sues Judicial Conference Over Forced Mental Health Evaluation by Cogan Schneier (claiming that the forced mental examination violates the Fifth and Fourth Amendments and separation of powers).