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Recent Posts
- IN: Overdose call led to EMS telling police what they saw and that led to SW
- NY1: A mental health defense waives REP in the medical records about it
- MA: When a likely Franks violation comes out at trial, def gets to reopen the suppression issue
- RI: Challenge to one sentence of 8-page cell phone records SW fails; totality has to be considered
- WaPo: Subpoena bill would curtail secretive tool used to target government critics
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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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"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: May 2026
TX: What does state need to raise when it appeals a suppression order?
An interesting opinion on appellate practice: The issue here: Whether the state waived one of its two arguments for sustaining a search by not appealing it. The court concludes it did not. Remanded. State v. Young, 2026 Tex. Crim. App. … Continue reading
SC: DNA sample by SW two weeks before trial was independent of one three years earlier during investigation
Defendant wasn’t in custody in a murder investigation when officers obtained a DNA sample from him in 2019, they believed voluntarily. As the case came closer to trial, the defense moved to suppress it because he’d lawyered up, so they … Continue reading
W.D.Wash.: Immigration arrest warrants can be signed by ALJs without violating 4A
“‘[C]onsistent with the Fourth Amendment, immigration authorities may arrest individuals for civil immigration removal purposes pursuant to an administrative arrest warrant issued by an executive official, rather than by a judge.’ Gonzalez v. U.S. Immigr. & Customs Enf’t, 975 F.3d … Continue reading
D.R.I.: DOJ administrative subpoena for children’s medical records quashed; DOJ’s “presumption of regularity” is gone
This administrative subpoena for Rhode Island children’s medical records is quashed. DOJ’s presumption of regularity of its actions is now gone. In re Administrative Subpoena 25-1431-032 to R.I. Hosp., 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 105676 (D.R.I. May 13, 2026) (Update: ATL: … Continue reading
FL3: Feds raided with SW but wouldn’t provide state with affidavit or warrant; state fails in burden of proving search was valid, even pleading GFE
Defendant was raided by the federal government for alleged cockfighting, and he claimed that “80-100” officers showed up “with bullet proof cars and ‘one of those war tanks.’” The product of the raid was given over to the state and … Continue reading
NM: Prosecutor’s question about PC for arrest warrant being found improper, but not reversible error here
It was improper for the prosecutor to question the arresting officer about the judge finding probable cause and issuing the arrest warrant. But, it was not so flagrant here to require reversal. State v. Aragon, 2026 N.M. LEXIS 81 (May … Continue reading
CA4: Criminal seizure of evidence here not a 4A or due process violation
Motorcycles under lien were seized as evidence in a biker shootout. The finance company sued under the Fourth Amendment and the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Deprivation of property as criminal evidence is not a violation of due … Continue reading
E.D.La.: ICE SDT to Orleans Parish Sheriff for immigration status of detainees was valid
ICE issued a subpoena to the Orleans Parish Criminal Sheriff for information about detainees’ immigration status. After oral argument, the subpoena was narrowed, and it now complies with Morton Salt which “incorporates the Fourth Amendment reasonableness standard that applies to … Continue reading
E.D.Tenn.: PO not needed for a parole search
Defendant’s claim of “reverse stalking horse” parole search because the PO wasn’t present fails. There was reasonable suspicion for the search. United States v. Rose, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 103581 (E.D. Tenn. May 11, 2026). The government gets the credibility … Continue reading
CA10: Officer’s peering through 1″ gap in curtains from outside was plain view
Denial of rehearing en banc: United States v. Watkins, 2026 U.S. App. LEXIS 13495 (10th Cir. May 11, 2026),* denial of rehearing en banc from United States v. Watkins, 156 F.4th 1049 (10th Cir. 2025):
VI: Cell phone SW didn’t show nexus to crime; possession alone not enough
There was a lack of nexus to cell phone to this alleged crime which voids the search warrant for it, and the good faith exception does not apply. Just having a cell phone on one’s person doesn’t link it to … Continue reading
D.Md.: Mere delay in opening hotel door for arrest warrant didn’t justify protective sweep under the mattress
The protective sweep of defendant’s room is suppressed because the government articulates no reasonable suspicion to believe anyone else was in there. Delay in opening the door isn’t it. Searching between the mattress and box springs was also unreasonable. Waiting … Continue reading
OH5: DTF officer can ask marked car to make stop
A DTF officer surveilling defendant who saw a traffic offense could ask a marked car to make a traffic stop. State v. Streeter, 2026-Ohio-1668 (5th Dist. May 5, 2026).* In the Fulton County 2020 ballot seizure and return case, the … Continue reading
OH5: Judge who issued SW could preside at trial
Defendant doesn’t show judicial bias at trial because the trial judge issued the search warrant two years earlier and didn’t remember it until during trial. No affidavit of bias filed. State v. Baker, 2026-Ohio-1628 (5th Dist. May 5, 2026). The … Continue reading
E.D.Va.: SW for WaPo’s reporter’s home and devices violated Privacy Protection Act
The search warrant for a Washington Post reporter’s computers, phone, and files violated the Privacy Protection Act because it was not evidence of a crime or contraband. It also implicates prior restraint on speech. The USMJ’s order that the court … Continue reading
E.D.N.Y.: Def’s attempt to escape from a warrantless arrest at the door was exigency
Officers came without a warrant to arrest defendant where he was spending the night, and he tried to escape. That was exigency. United States v. Richard, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 99358 (E.D.N.Y. May 5, 2026). Defendant’s presence in someone else’s … Continue reading
CA1 declines to get into whether undocumented persons are “people” with 4A rights
The First Circuit declines to get into the issue of whether an undocumented person here is part of the “people” with Fourth Amendment rights, instead deciding he loses on the merits. United States v. Vizcaíno-Peguero, 2026 U.S. App. LEXIS 13000 … Continue reading
E.D.Va.: SWs don’t have to specify how they’re executed; photos of posed hands not suppressed
The warrant here required “photographing his hands, fingers, and forearms.” The search warrant’s particularity wasn’t violated by manipulating his hands to allegedly mimic what was seen in child pornography photographs off his computer. Search warrants don’t have to specify how … Continue reading
Reason: Surveillance Tools Intended for Border Control Are Being Used Against Americans
Reason: Surveillance Tools Intended for Border Control Are Being Used Against Americans by J.D. Tuccille (“U.S. citizens are being monitored and punished with technology meant to battle illegal immigration.”)