Archives
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Recent Posts
- 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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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)
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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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"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
CO: After first SW for cell phone was suppressed for Franks violation, second was valid with independent source
Defendant was subjected to two search warrants for his cell phones in possession of the police. A motion to suppress the first search was granted because the officer recklessly included false information that deprived it of probable cause. The police … Continue reading
E.D.Cal.: Using drug dog in the patrol car didn’t prolong the stop
There was a factual basis for the stop, and the drug dog at hand did not prolong the stop. After the alert, defendant then consented to the search of the vehicle. United States v. Navarro, 2020 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 3062 … Continue reading
NJ: Civil forfeiture answer can’t be used against a criminal defendant under Garrity
A defendant’s answers in a civil forfeiture action cannot be introduced in a parallel criminal proceeding under the authority of Garrity v. New Jersey. Here, however, it proves to be harmless error. State v. Melendez, 2020 N.J. LEXIS 2 (Jan. … Continue reading
WaPo: Investigative tool used in law firm searches at risk, federal prosecutors fear
WaPo: Investigative tool used in law firm searches at risk, federal prosecutors fear by Ann E. Marimow (“Last spring, more than a dozen federal agents spent six hours searching the law firm of a prominent Maryland attorney, sweeping up thousands … Continue reading
The Crime Report: Utah Considers Legislation to Block Police From DNA Searches
The Crime Report: Utah Considers Legislation to Block Police From DNA Searches (“A new bill being drafted by Utah Representatives would block investigators from having accessibility to DNA databases when trying to solve crimes and cold cases. The bill’s organizer … Continue reading
The Federalist: The FISA Court Is Complicit In The FBI Abuses It’s Raising Cain Over
The Federalist: The FISA Court Is Complicit In The FBI Abuses It’s Raising Cain Over by Margot Cleveland:
CA11: Border search of disabled vessel towed to port obviated need to decide warrantless planting of GPS on it
Defendant’s vessel broke down off West Palm Beach, and CBP boarded it when it was towed in for a border search. Nothing was found, but various things about the boat, like it’s prior owner was a drug trafficker and defendant’s … Continue reading
TN: Defense counsel not ineffective for recommending guilty plea where motion to suppress denied and case would have gone to trial on other counts even if granted
Defendant challenges on post-conviction his counsel being ineffective in recommending a guilty plea after the motion to suppress was denied. Even if it had been granted, defendant was going to trial on other counts, and he can’t show that defense … Continue reading
D.Utah: Unlatching but not opening car door to look inside then shutting it was attenuated from dog sniff that gave PC
Officers unlatched the door of a suspicious car parked on an cul-de-sac away from houses, and the car was suspected of a theft from a Sam’s store. The door was shut without looking inside and then a drug dog was … Continue reading
E.D.Pa.: Leaked existence of federal SW that had press there before the SW results in statutory damages award
Plaintiff sued the government because the IRS and FBI leaked to the media a search warrant for his premises and the media was there. He got $1000 in statutory damages. He filed an untimely motion to reopen based on alleged … Continue reading
CA7 (en banc): Heck bar overcome by pardon, which started SOL
Plaintiff sued for malicious prosecution after he was imprisoned for a 1977 murder, paroled, and finally pardoned by the Governor. The pardon overcame the Heck bar, and the claim became ripe with the pardon. The court takes the occasion to … Continue reading
C.D.Ill.: Seemingly idle questions during a traffic stop didn’t unreasonably extend it in any “measurable way”
Seemingly idle questions during a traffic stop didn’t unreasonably extend it in any “measurable way.” United States v. Goodwill, 2020 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1831 (C.D. Ill. Jan. 3, 2020):
S.D.Ga.: Stopping writing traffic ticket to ask about drugs without RS violated Rodriguez
The officer’s intentional delaying issuance of a traffic ticket was to ask about transporting drugs, even though only 100 seconds, was unreasonable under Rodriguez because it was an intentional deviation from the mission of the stop. United States v. Brinson, … Continue reading
NC: Reasonable force can be used for a DUI blood draw under SW when def refuses
Officers had a search warrant for defendant’s blood while he was in the hospital for an accident. Relying on United States v. Bullock, 71 F.3d 171 (5th Cir. 1995), the court concludes that reasonable force can be used to take … Continue reading
GA: Smell of alcohol on person maybe a minor walking in a high crime area wasn’t RS
“Further, the other facts identified by the State do not support a reasonable suspicion of illegal activity. None of C.B.’s described activities—walking on the side of the road at night, being present in a high-crime area, wearing a backpack, and … Continue reading
D.C.Cir.: Dewey and Mine Safety Act provide for no precompliance warning or review before inspection
The petitioner here was a contractor working at a mine, and a mine safety inspector looked at equipment and cited the contractor a $116 fine. The ALJ denied relief, and, on a petition for review of the fine, the court … Continue reading
NYTimes: F.B.I. Asks Apple to Help Unlock Two iPhones
NYTimes: F.B.I. Asks Apple to Help Unlock Two iPhones by Jack Nicas and Katie Benner (“The request could reignite a fight between the Silicon Valley giant and law enforcement over access to encrypted technology.”)
WaPo: Editorial: California’s privacy law was supposed to spur Congress to act. It flubbed instead.
WaPo: Editorial: California’s privacy law was supposed to spur Congress to act. It flubbed instead. (“Last year was supposed to be the year of a federal privacy law. But Congress flubbed it, so the digital privacy law that seems likely … Continue reading
WaPo: At CES, Apple, Facebook and Amazon are preaching privacy. Don’t believe the hype.
WaPo: At CES, Apple, Facebook and Amazon are preaching privacy. Don’t believe the hype. by Geoffrey A. Fowler