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- D.Utah: Minor time detours to writing up a traffic ticket didn’t unreasonable extend this stop; the dog was quickly on its way
- KY: Despite lack of nexus, SW sustained under GFE
- CO: DNA could be seized from trash
- CA8: Nebraska statute allowing SWs to cross state lines doesn’t violate 4A
- WA: Sweat patch as condition of release violated state constitution’s privacy provision
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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: July 2019
SF Chronical: DNA hearings: SF officers gave suspect in rapes alcohol test even though they didn’t think he was drunk
SF Chronical: DNA hearings: SF officers gave suspect in rapes alcohol test even though they didn’t think he was drunk by Evan Sernoffsky: San Francisco police never smelled alcohol when they pulled over Orlando Vilchez Lazo last year. They never … Continue reading
CA5: Revd for failure to determine “clearly established law” for QI
“Both parties and the district court failed to address qualified immunity’s second question. The district court did not consider whether Defendants’ conduct—even assuming it violated the Fourth Amendment—violated clearly established law. See Morrow, 917 F.3d at 874. McDonald points to … Continue reading
CA9: Def’s two probation searches, back to back, were reasonable
Defendant was properly subjected to a probation search. The first search led to a second search. United States v. Hardesty, 2019 U.S. App. LEXIS 20724 (9th Cir. July 12, 2019).* Defendant doesn’t get discovery of the entire breadth of this … Continue reading
S.D.N.Y.: Driver’s cell phone search in 2017 NYC truck attack on pedestrians attributed to ISIS was with PC and was particular
The defendant in the 2017 New York City truck attack attributed to ISIS moved to suppress his cell phone search, primarily on the ground that ubiquity of cell phones alone isn’t enough. There was more. The court credits the FBI … Continue reading
Daily Beast: ‘Red Flags’ as New Documents Point to Blind Spots of NYPD ‘Predictive Policing’
Daily Beast: ‘Red Flags’ as New Documents Point to Blind Spots of NYPD ‘Predictive Policing’ by Ali Winston: “They’re digitizing the legacy of stop-and-frisk. This is effectively math-washing racially biased policing practices.”
The Atlantic: On the Road, Police Power Has Few Limits
The Atlantic: On the Road, Police Power Has Few Limits by Sarah A. Seo: Officers have wide discretion when they pull over motorists. And the courts keep giving them more.
NY3: Evidence seized from defense counsel was not privileged because of crime-fraud exception
Somehow, papers were seized [or obtained] from the county public defender in the case [without explanation, which is not uncommon in New York appellate cases], and defendant claimed attorney-client privilege. The court finds the crime-fraud exception applies, and what was … Continue reading
D.R.I.: CSLI warrant lacked PC and GFE not applied
In what may be a first, the District of Rhode Island suppresses both CSLI and an apartment search warrant for lack of probable cause and then declines to apply the good faith exception. United States v. Ramos, 2019 U.S. Dist. … Continue reading
Finished all three book supplements over the weekend
Getting back to the blog. Why do all three editors want the supplement by mid-July?
WSJ: Immigration-Enforcement Raids Begin in New York
WSJ: Immigration-Enforcement Raids Begin in New York by Jim Carlton and Corinne Ramey: ICE agents attempt raids in at least two city neighborhoods; President Trump says roundups will focus on criminals And some were stymied by lack of warrants.
NYTimes: How Dangerous Is Facial Recognition Technology?
NYTimes: How Dangerous Is Facial Recognition Technology? by Sahil Chinoy: When will we finally learn we cannot predict people’s character from their appearance?
UT: 40 minute delay for dog was reasonable where it was tied up in another part of same investigation
The 40 minute delay for the dog sniff, already based on reasonable suspicion, was reasonable. The dog was at a residence related to the same investigation then came to where the car was stopped. The court also mentions the weather … Continue reading
FL4: Gratuitious references to SWs before jury became prejudicial character evidence; reversed
Two references to search warrants at defendant’s premises became prejudicial character evidence by seeking to link him to other drugs. Conviction reversed. Dawson v. State, 2019 Fla. App. LEXIS 10847 (Fla. 4th DCA July 10, 2019):
ID: State didn’t preserve independent source issue below so it can’t argue it on appeal
A motion to suppress cell phone contents was granted, and the state appealed. At trial, it cited a case without stating the holding that was an independent source case, and that’s not enough. In addition, the state didn’t litigate independent … Continue reading
CT: Def didn’t abandon his apt when he was in jail and rent came due
Defendant did not abandon his crime victim’s cell phone hidden in a wall when he’d been incarcerated and was evicted from his house for nonpayment of rent. The police waited until the lease had expired for nonpayment and came to … Continue reading
NYTimes: Opinion: The Racist History Behind Facial Recognition
NYTimes: Opinion: The Racist History Behind Facial Recognition When will we finally learn we cannot predict people’s character from their appearance?
WaPo Podcast: The FBI and ICE are scanning millions of Americans’ faces — without their knowledge or consent
WaPo Podcast: The FBI and ICE are scanning millions of Americans’ faces — without their knowledge or consent
USA Today: Customs officers barred from randomly checking papers on domestic flights
USA Today: Customs officers barred from randomly checking papers on domestic flights by Alan Gomez:
S.D.N.Y.: IP information does not provide anywhere near the “granular” detail that CSLI or GPS information does, so SW not required
IP information does not provide anywhere near the “granular” detail that CSLI or GPS information does, so a search warrant is not required. United States v. Kidd, 2019 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 114627 (S.D. N.Y. July 11, 2019) (citing United States … Continue reading
CA11: Officer’s second gunshot at a dog not clearly established as excessive force; QI granted, ptf not even a target
Excessive force qualified immunity case: A second gunshot at a dog wasn’t clearly established to be excessive force, and plaintiff wasn’t even a target. Therefore, the officer gets qualified immunity. Corbitt v. Vickers, 2019 U.S. App. LEXIS 20447 (11th Cir. … Continue reading