September 2026 S M T W T F S 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 Archives
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Recent Posts
- WaPo: Americans have turned against police cameras that track license plates, new survey shows
- W.D.Tex.: What is the duty of the neutral and detached magistrate?
- D.Me.: Yes, more investigation could have been done, but there’s still PC on what there was
- CA3: Brady doesn’t apply to SW materials
- E.D.Mich.: Person a cell phone was given to as gift could consent to search
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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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NACDL’s Domestic Drone Information Center
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Criminal Appeal (post-conviction) (9th Cir.)
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)
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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. 
Category Archives: Burden of pleading
D.Ariz.: SW for firearm didn’t go stale
This search warrant for a firearm wasn’t stale because firearms are kept. In any event, the good faith exception applies. United States v. Cherry, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 178900 (D. Ariz. Aug. 11, 2026).* Defendant’s failure to file a post-trial … Continue reading
S.D.W.Va.: Admission to a little marijuana in backpack didn’t justify search of her car trunk
Defendant’s admission to the officers she had a little marijuana in her backpack didn’t justify a search of the trunk. United States v. Bowling, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 169576 (S.D. W. Va. July 30, 2026). Plaintiff’s § 1983 false arrest … Continue reading
FL5: State failed to show justification for delay for dog sniff
This being a warrantless search during a traffic stop with a drug dog, the state bore the burden of proof on justification for detention for the dog sniff, and it failed to show that the stop was lawfully continued. Reversed. … Continue reading
CA9: When the PC for SW dissipates, the search must stop; no GFE
“This case raises the familiar, but always troubling, question whether someone can be prosecuted for despicable criminal conduct using evidence obtained in violation of the Fourth Amendment. Here, officers conducting a search of Defendant John Holcomb’s computer, pursuant to a … Continue reading
D.Md.: Govt’s motion to reconsider granted motion to suppress denied; arguments now are too late
The government’s motion to reconsider of a granted motion to suppress presents theories that should have been in its original responses and not now. United States v. Cleckley, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 155016 (D. Md. July 14, 2026):
OH2: Stop outside the officer’s jurisdiction doesn’t violate 4A
A traffic stop outside the officer’s jurisdiction doesn’t violate the Fourth Amendment. State v. Sexton, 2026-Ohio-2636, 2026 Ohio App. LEXIS 2551 (2d Dist. July 10, 2026). A habeas petitioner has no right to discovery of search warrant affidavits. Moreover, he … Continue reading
D.R.I.: Defense attorney’s affidavit for Franks motion was insufficient for lack of personal knowledge
The defense attorney’s affidavit for defendant’s Franks motion is insufficient because he had no direct knowledge. There was probable cause for the warrant. United States v. Rosario, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 125981 (D.R.I. June 8, 2026). Protective sweep for a … Continue reading
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
D.D.C.: Alleged illegal arrest doesn’t void DNA SW
Defendant’s allegedly unlawful arrest doesn’t void the later search warrant for a DNA swab based on independent grounds, and not mentioning the alleged illegal arrest. United States v. Smith, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 96554 (D.D.C. May 1, 2026). Driving a … Continue reading
MS: Failure to include SW materials anywhere in record was waiver of issues about it
Failure to include the search warrant materials anywhere in the record, either as an attachment to the motion or an exhibit at a hearing, is waiver for appeal on whether the warrant was properly issued. Burdine v. State, 2026 Miss. … Continue reading
CA6: Occasionally spending the night at the place searched doesn’t give standing
Occasionally spending the night at the place searched doesn’t give standing. United States v. Carney, 2026 U.S. App. LEXIS 8792 (6th Cir. Mar. 24, 2026). There was no reasonable suspicion for defendant’s frisk, and the gun found is suppressed. United … Continue reading
N.D.W.Va.: Bare allegations of a Franks violation without a significant offer of proof is conjecture
Bare allegations of a Franks violation without a significant offer of proof is conjecture. Kokinda v. Foster, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 60028 (N.D.W. Va. Mar. 23, 2026).* Exigent circumstances justified the seizure of defendant’s cell phone, not just plain view, … Continue reading
D.N.M.: 4A question for appeal significant enough to require bail pending appeal
Defendant’s search and seizure question for appeal on the independent source doctrine is significant enough to grant him release pending appeal. United States v. Haack, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 60440 (D.N.M. Mar. 20, 2026). The state’s justifications for reasonable suspicion … Continue reading
D.N.D.: ALPR not a search
ALPR not a search. United States v. Lawrence, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 56945 (D.N.D. Mar. 18, 2026). Failure to show materiality for Franks requires the court to also consider the elements of the crime being investigated. United States v. Engler, … Continue reading
CA2: Def’s affidavit of standing failed to show it; who gave permission to be there and when?
Defendant didn’t show standing in his affidavit offer of proof to pursue his motion to suppress. It wasn’t his place and he had limited use of it but doesn’t say who gave access. United States v. Caesar, 2026 U.S. App. … Continue reading
W.D.Wis.: Pro se ptf gets jury trial verdict for $550,000 for illegal search and malicious prosecution
Pro se plaintiff gets jury trial verdict for $550,000 for illegal search and malicious prosecution thereafter. The jury was free to conclude that the basis for the search was invented. Coleman v. Sperry, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 52527 (W.D. Wis. … Continue reading
CA11: QI in excessive force cases can be raised for the first time mid-trial
Qualified immunity in excessive force cases can be raised for the first time mid-trial without it being waived. Edwards v. Grubbs, 2026 U.S. App. LEXIS 7500 (11th Cir. Mar. 13, 2026). “However, Groth must show not only that the officers … Continue reading
D.Utah: Traffic stop on curtilage is still valid
A traffic stop on the curtilage affords police the ability to stop and inquire under Collins v. Virginia. “Curtilage is a concept that safeguards a person’s right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures, but it is not a … Continue reading
GA: State post-conviction petitioner arguing no “full and fair opportunity” to litigate 4A claim fails
Post-conviction petitioner trying to get around Stone on federal habeas fails. Gines v. State, 2026 Ga. LEXIS 87 (Mar. 12, 2026)*:
NYCo.: Arrests can’t be suppressed
“Defendant was charged with committing specific acts of violence against an identifiable person, who reported the incident. An arrest itself cannot be suppressed as fruit of the poisonous tree, and defendant himself was not a suppressible fruit. Nor was he … Continue reading