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- Bloomberg Law: Texas’ 100-Plus Year Investigatory Tool Ruled Unconstitutional
- D.Minn.: State law permits POs to conduct “unannounced visits” and that includes unannounced warrantless searches
- E.D.Va.: Three images from ALPR in 30 days wasn’t enough for a Carpenter violation
- CA5: The 4A doesn’t limit the number of officers that show up for an administrative search
- D.Idaho: The exclusionary rule does not apply in pretrial release revocations
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ABA Journal Web 100, Best Law Blogs (2017); ABA Journal Blawg 100 (2015-16) (discontinued 2018)
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by John Wesley Hall
Criminal Defense Lawyer and
Search and seizure law consultant
Little Rock, Arkansas
Contact: forhall @ aol.com / The Book
www.johnwesleyhall.com -
© 2003-24,
online since Feb. 24, 2003 Approx. 425,000 visits (non-robot) since 2012 Approx. 45,000 posts since 2003 (27,400+ on WordPress as of 7/23/24) -
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Congressional Research Service:
--Electronic Communications Privacy Act (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) -
“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 -
"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] -
“You know, most men would get discouraged by now. Fortunately for you, I am not most men!”
---Pepé Le Pew "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)
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Category Archives: General warrant
WaPo: Google cuts part of team that vets police requests for user data
WaPo: +Google cuts part of team that vets police requests for user data by Gerrit De Vynck (“The tech giant gives reams of data to police. It has laid off part of the team that ensures those requests are legal. … Continue reading
D.P.R.: Cut-and-paste error that misidentified iPhone model overlooked by correct phone number
The search warrant was for a specific phone number on an iPhone 6S, but the phone with that number was an iPhone 13. Still, the phone number controlled, and the search was valid. Alternatively, on the totality, defendant consented to … Continue reading
E.D.Wis.: “Whistleblower” is still a CI whose story must be corroborated
A business fraud “whistleblower”’s statement was too conclusory to show probable cause. Franks hearing granted. United States v. Schampers, 2023 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 68205 (E.D. Wis. Apr. 19, 2023). Defendant was driving back and forth between Plattsburgh NY and Burlington … Continue reading
GA: SW for practically everything on cell phone was a general warrant
The search warrant for defendant’s cell phone was overbroad, essentially permitting a general search of the entirety of information on it. Limiting it to a homicide was of no help. The good faith exception also does not apply. The fact … Continue reading
USA Today: Cold cases cracked by cellphones: How police are using geofence warrants to solve crimes
USA Today: Cold cases cracked by cellphones: How police are using geofence warrants to solve crimes by Christopher Damien & Nick Penzenstadler (“Mike Price, litigation director at the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyer’s Fourth Amendment Center, said innocent bystanders … Continue reading
W.D.Mo.: SW for the entirety of def’s Instagram account was not a general search
The warrant for the entirety of defendant’s Instagram account was not a general search. United States v. Smith, 2022 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 147892 (W.D. Mo. Aug. 18, 2022). Seeing a handgun protruding from defendant’ waistband as he walked down the … Continue reading
DE: “Any and all data” on a cell phone was a general warrant
A cell phone search warrant for any and all data without restriction was not particular and amounted to a general warrant. The use of the product of the search was not harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. Taylor v. State, No. … Continue reading
OR: SW for evidence of murder on cell phone was general search as to its pictures
The search warrant for defendant’s cell phone permitted officers to search for location information, texts, and calls around the time of the murder. It also permitted a search for evidence of attempted murder. Officers found a picture of a gun … Continue reading
W.D.Tex.: “Laundry list” argument of a lack of particularity rejected
The officer affiant corroborated the CI’s information and there was substantial evidence of probable cause. The affidavit was not bare bones. Even if the affidavit lacked probable cause, the good faith exception applies. Defendant’s “laundry list” argument of a lack … Continue reading
CO: SW for everything on cell phone was general warrant in violation of 4A
The search warrant for defendant’s cell phone had a particular list of files sought, but it still was effectively a general warrant in violation of the Fourth Amendment because it sought virtually everything on the cell phone without regard to … Continue reading
NY2: Business records search was not particular except as to time and was a general warrant
The AG’s office obtained a search warrant for defendant’s business for allegations of mortgage fraud. Several computers, hard drives, and many records were seized. After denial of suppression, defendant entered a conditional plea. The search warrant was a “general warrant” … Continue reading
CA7: Cell phone SW that permitted viewing all files of phone was not too “general”
A search warrant for the entire contents of a cell phone was particular and not a general warrant considering that the warrant sought evidence of “criminal recklessness with a deadly weapon” or related to drug dealing. United States v. Bishop, … Continue reading
IL: SW in murder investigation was general and sought drug evidence without showing PC for it
The search warrant in a murder investigation didn’t incorporate the affidavit in support, and it wasn’t present for the search, so this warrant was too general to support a search. The search warrant was shown to be for a drug … Continue reading
ABAJ: North Carolina police issue broad warrants for data from Google users near crime scenes
ABAJ: North Carolina police issue broad warrants for data from Google users near crime scenes by Jason Tashea:
CA6: Seizure under SW was valid despite a catchall phrase because it was severable; suppression of phone search reversed
Defendants were suspected of committing a series of home invasion robberies, and they were charged with racketeering. The district court suppressed the searches of their phones for the use of language too general. The government concedes there was an overbroad … Continue reading
NYLJ: Computer Searches: A ‘General’ Warrant Can No Longer Satisfy Requirements
NYLJ: Computer Searches: A ‘General’ Warrant Can No Longer Satisfy Requirements by Roger L. Stavis (May 19, 2017):