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- E.D.Ky.: When court can’t tell the dog alerted, motion to suppress granted
- OH1: A malnourished child isn’t exigency for an infant
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- D.Me.: Looking around house when allegedly “freezing” it was an illegal search
- OR: Police listening to attorney-client jail calls because attorney calls not properly segregated leads to dismissal of some counts and setting aside guilty plea
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ABA Journal Web 100, Best Law Blogs (2017); ABA Journal Blawg 100 (2015-16) (discontinued 2018)
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by John Wesley Hall
Criminal Defense Lawyer and
Search and seizure law consultant
Little Rock, Arkansas
Contact: forhall @ aol.com / The Book
www.johnwesleyhall.com -
© 2003-24,
online since Feb. 24, 2003 Approx. 425,000 visits (non-robot) since 2012 Approx. 45,000 posts since 2003 (26,730+ on WordPress as of 12/31/23) -
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Fourth Amendment cases,
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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 -
"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] -
“You know, most men would get discouraged by now. Fortunately for you, I am not most men!”
---Pepé Le Pew "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)
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Monthly Archives: June 2019
D.Kan.: In a civil case, the court takes judicial notice of a search warrant in PACER in the same court
“The court takes judicial notice of the existence of the search warrant as part of its own files and records from judicial proceedings which do not convert motions under Rule 12(b)(6) into motions for summary judgment. See Tal v. Hogan, … Continue reading
TechDirt: Data From Court Documents Shows Texas Law Enforcement Playing Small-Ball Forfeiture, Not Doing Much To Stop Drug Trafficking
TechDirt: Data From Court Documents Shows Texas Law Enforcement Playing Small-Ball Forfeiture, Not Doing Much To Stop Drug Trafficking by Tim Cushing: Small seizures work out best for law enforcement. The cost of fighting the forfeiture usually outpaces the value … Continue reading
NYTimes: Opinion: A Major Police Body Cam Company Just Banned Facial Recognition
NYTimes: Opinion: A Major Police Body Cam Company Just Banned Facial Recognition: Its ethics board says the technology is not reliable enough to justify using.
SCOTUS: Warrantless blood draw from unconscious driver not unreasonable
A warrantless blood draw from an unconscious driver who became unconscious by the time he arrived at the hospital was reasonable under a state law that permits warrantless BAC testing of those incapable of consent by implied consent. Remanded, however, … Continue reading
CA8: PC shown for Facebook SW; no suppression just because Facebook produced on the 15th day
Officers had seen photographs on defendant’s Facebook page holding guns, and he was a convicted felon. There was thus probable cause for a search warrant to Facebook to produce the account. The warrant was served on Facebook with a 14 … Continue reading
D.Me.: Byrd doesn’t confer standing in the other car in a caravan
Byrd does not confer standing in a rented car part of a two-car caravan where defendant didn’t rent the other car and wasn’t even in it. United States v. Beauregard, 2019 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 106904 (D. Me. June 26, 2019). … Continue reading
E.D.N.C.: No IAC in foregoing motion to suppress to tamp down more bad facts and plea bargain instead
Facing a 21 U.S.C. § 851 enhancement, it was objectively reasonable strategy for defense counsel to forego a doubtful motion to suppress that would dredge up additional bad facts and make plea bargaining harder. Thomas v. United States, 2019 U.S. … Continue reading
FL3: A flash drive plugged into a work computer is subject to search as a part of the work computer
Defendant was employed by the Miami-Dade Police Department and worked in the armory. She was suspected of falsifying police reports to get her husband fired from his job. When investigators went to her work computer, her personal flash drive was … Continue reading
MS: No passenger standing in car despite well-secreted drugs
Defendant argued he had standing in a car because he was more than a mere passenger because of how the drugs were hidden and “because ‘[h]e had access to parts of the car that were not normally accessible to a … Continue reading
S.D.Ill.: No 4A claim for prison lockdown and shakedown for drugs
There is no Fourth Amendment claim available to an inmate at USP Marion for prison wide shakedowns for two days after drugs came in and the prison went into lockdown. Kammeyer v. True, 2019 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 107060 (S.D. Ill. … Continue reading
NY1: Search incident of a “booster bag” at time of arrest outside a store was reasonable
Defendants were involved in store thefts with a “booster bag” where they were going into the stores and making off with stuff in bag and then transferring it to a rolling suitcase on the street. When the police observed a … Continue reading
C.D.Ill.: Def’s name and address aren’t constitutionally required to be in the SW
Defendant’s 2255 claim that his name and address weren’t in the search warrant doesn’t state any ground for relief because neither is constitutionally required. Lopez v. United States, 2019 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 105807 (C.D. Ill. June 25, 2019). The affidavit … Continue reading
D.Conn.: Ptf’s § 1983 case over his search that led to his conviction is barred by Heck
Plaintiff’s suit against his search and seizure that led to his conviction is barred by Heck v. Humphrey. “The appropriate vehicle for such a challenge is not § 1983 litigation, but direct or collateral appeal.” Gonzalez v. Yepes, 2019 U.S. … Continue reading
GA: No REP in a police interview room where a call was overheard and recorded
There is no reasonable expectation of privacy in a police interview room. Defendant had been Mirandized and left alone in the room, knowing he was not free to leave, and told he was a suspect in a crime. He made … Continue reading
S.D.Fla.: Ptf sufficiently pled a civil Franks claim that survives summary judgment and QI
Plaintiff sufficiently pled a civil Franks claim that survives summary judgment and qualified immunity. Wooden v. Armenteros, 2019 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 106113 (S.D. Fla. June 25, 2019).* “At this stage of the proceedings, viewing the evidence in the light most … Continue reading
E.D.Mich.: The affidavit for SW didn’t show nexus, but it wasn’t so lacking that GFE still didn’t apply
The court concludes that the government lacked nexus to defendant’s home for the search warrant because the proof was just lacking. It came down to two cases with similar but still sufficiently different facts reaching seemingly contradictory results on nexus. … Continue reading
GA: Def was properly allowed at trial to cross-examine searching officer about contents of affidavit despite the affidavit not coming into evidence
Defendant was allowed to cross-examine the investigator concerning the contents of the search warrant application to impeach. The trial court’s not permitting the actual affidavit into evidence wasn’t prejudicial. Hawkins v. State, 2019 Ga. App. LEXIS 377 (June 24, 2019). … Continue reading
D.S.D.: Contents of partially open box in post office was within plain view
A priority mail box was partially open and inadequately sealed in a post office on tribal lands. A baggie of apparent methamphetamine was visible inside. The post office called the tribal police, and that officer saw it too. This was … Continue reading
WaPo: Data brokers are selling your secrets. Some states are trying to stop them. It isn’t easy.
WaPo: Data brokers are selling your secrets. Some states are trying to stop them. It isn’t easy. By Douglas MacMillan: Vermont’s new data broker registry highlights the difficulties of regulating dozens of secretive firms that buy and sell the personal … Continue reading