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- D.Utah: Minor detours to writing up a traffic ticket didn’t unreasonably 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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To search Search and Seizure on Lexis.com $ -
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General (many free):
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Federal Law Enforcement Training Center Resources
FBI Domestic Investigations and Operations Guide (2008) (pdf)
DEA Agents Manual (2002) (download)
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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)
ACLU on privacy
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NACDL’s Domestic Drone Information Center
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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: January 2020
CA8: Handcuffing a park jogger who was watching a traffic stop for not giving SSN was unreasonable
Handcuffing plaintiff for merely stopping to watch a St. Louis police officer conduct traffic stops in the park where he was jogging violated clearly established law on plaintiff’s facts. Walker v. City of Pine Bluff, 414 F.3d 989 (8th Cir. … Continue reading
CA4: RS is the standard for a prison visitor strip search
Reasonable suspicion is the standard for a prison visitor strip search, and officers had reasonable suspicion here. Calloway v. Lokey, 2020 U.S. App. LEXIS 1756 (4th Cir. Jan. 21, 2020):
WaPo: Saudi crown prince implicated in hack of Jeff Bezos’s phone, U.N. report will say
WaPo: Saudi crown prince implicated in hack of Jeff Bezos’s phone, U.N. report will say by Marc Fisher and Steven Zeitchik (“A United Nations investigation to be released Wednesday will report that Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’s cellphone was hacked in … Continue reading
LA4: Lack of apt no. in SW wasn’t inspecific where officers were directed to his door
The search warrant for defendant’s apartment didn’t have the apartment number, but the warrant was specific and directed the officers to his door. That was constitutionally adequate. State v. Gilmartin, 2020 La. App. LEXIS 118 (La. App. 4 Cir. Jan. … Continue reading
The Center Square: Illinois Supreme Court could decide if smell of marijuana is enough to justify police search
The Center Square: Illinois Supreme Court could decide if smell of marijuana is enough to justify police search by Greg Bishop:
D.Minn.: Search and seizure of cell phone was private search
Three adults worked to get access to defendant’s cell phone because he was sexting a minor. “Moreover, even assuming solely for the sake of argument that Dustin Clark had wrongfully taken Minor A’s phone from Defendant Walsh and Deputy Bennett … Continue reading
NYTimes: ‘I Was Wrong,’ Bloomberg Says. But This Policy Still Haunts Him.
NYTimes: ‘I Was Wrong,’ Bloomberg Says. But This Policy Still Haunts Him. By Emma G. Fitzsimmons and Joseph Goldstein (“After defending the stop-and-frisk policing tactic, the former mayor apologized. But black voters in the Democratic presidential race may not forgive … Continue reading
ID: Def left his own door open before the dog sniff; and sniff wasn’t otherwise unreasonable
Defendant got out of his car and left the door open, so it was already open when the dog sniff occurred. Opening the door was not a command. “We decline, however, to rule that an officer’s knock on a driver’s … Continue reading
WaPo: How William Barr could make everyone’s iPhone more vulnerable
WaPo: How William Barr could make everyone’s iPhone more vulnerable:
Law360: Lawmakers Push To Extend Atty-Client Shield To Prison Emails
Law360: Lawmakers Push To Extend Atty-Client Shield To Prison Emails by RJ Vogt:
The Intercept: Facebook Warrant Targeting Student Journalists in Puerto Rico Prompts Fears of Political Surveillance
The Intercept: Facebook Warrant Targeting Student Journalists in Puerto Rico Prompts Fears of Political Surveillance by Alleen Brown & Alice Speri. After student protests to budget cuts at Puerto Rico’s university, seven were charged. Apparently Facebook search warrants were used:
Lawfare: Apple vs FBI: Pensacola Isn’t San Bernardino
Lawfare: Apple vs FBI: Pensacola Isn’t San Bernardino by Nicholas Weaver:
AL: Statutory violation in arrest wasn’t a 4A violation; arrest not suppressed (on rehearing)
Reversing itself on rehearing (prior opinion Berry v. State, 2019 Ala. Crim. App. LEXIS 64 (Sept. 20, 2019)), the court concludes that a potential statutory violation was not a Fourth Amendment violation. The officer knew of warrants for defendant’s arrest … Continue reading
N.D.Cal. & W.D.Wash.: Summons in IRS Bitcoin investigation should be limited as to years covered
The IRS summons in a cryptocurrency investigation, the government satisfied the Powell standard with the exception of a proper time limitation on the years covered. Similar is Zietzke v. United States, 2019 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 204274 (W.D. Wash. Nov. 25, … Continue reading
CA6: Frisk for eating out of a dumpster was unreasonable
Plaintiff’s frisk for eating out of a dumpster was unreasonable. He wasn’t committing any crime. Jones v. City of ElyriaJones v. City of ElyriaJones v. City of Elyria, 2020 U.S. App. LEXIS 1609 (6th Cir. Jan. 17, 2020).* There was … Continue reading
W.D.Va.: Omitted information was critical to PC finding; Franks challenge succeeds on recklessness and materiality
Defendant’s Franks challenges succeeds. Enough information was omitted from the affidavit for search warrant that the USMJ would not get a clear picture of what was really going on. And, it was material to the finding of probable cause. Motion … Continue reading
OH6: Effort to distance oneself from place searched led to lack of standing
Appellant’s challenge to the search warrant was to one in the trial court and then tried to expand the issue on appeal. Moreover, she tried to distance herself from the places to be searched to the point she had no … Continue reading
Two on searches related to impoundments, one from 2001
Defendant is now subject to a RICO prosecution, and he challenges a 2001 traffic stop. “When the investigating officers pulled him over, Banks was driving without a license, an offense under California law. The officers therefore had probable cause to … Continue reading