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- CA2: Taking 3-day-old son from mother affected father’s 4A & 14A rights too
- TX14: Affidavit for SW gets deferential standard of review by both the trial court and appellate court
- E.D.Cal.: Just because one officer smelled tobacco in def’s pipe didn’t mean others couldn’t sniff, too
- W.D.N.Y.: Emergency disclosure requests in Buffalo Tops grocery shooting were valid
- W.D.Okla.: 49 lbs fentanyl suppressed for Rodriguez violation
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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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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)
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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. 
Category Archives: Immigration arrests
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
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
CA9: Illegal arrest doesn’t justify dismissal of indictment
An illegal arrest doesn’t justify dismissing an indictment. He also did not show outrageous governmental conduct. United States v. Colfax, 2026 U.S. App. LEXIS 11426 (9th Cir. Apr. 22, 2026). The officer knew Dodge pickup trucks, and the registration on … Continue reading
C.D.Cal.: Bivens not extended to ICE workplace arrest
Bivens will not be extended to an ICE workplace arrest, per Egbert. Hernandez v. Dep’t of Homeland Sec., 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 61367 (C.D. Cal. Mar. 9, 2026):
E.D.Cal.: AUSA avoids sanction for refusing to answer court’s 4A question in ICE case; the petitioner had already been released
AUSA in an immigration detention case was directed to respond to the detainee’s Fourth Amendment claim and completely failed, only repeating the government’s theory of the case. Petitioner was finally released. The AUSA doesn’t get sanctioned, but the court is … Continue reading
W.D.Wash.: Habeas not remedy for immigration arrest without PC
Even if an immigration arrest lacked probable cause, habeas isn’t the remedy. Reyes v. Hermosilla, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 41279 (W.D. Wash. Jan. 15, 2026)*:
D.Minn.: Preliminary injunction granted against immigration arrests under 8 U.S.C. § 1159(a) because they violate 4A
Preliminary injunction granted against immigration arrests under 8 U.S.C. § 1159(a) because they violate the Fourth Amendment. U.H.A. v. Bondi, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 40545 (D. Minn. Feb. 27, 2026)*:
OR: Stop became a seizure when questions turned to travel plans
“Applying those principles here, we conclude that, under the totality of the circumstances, defendant was seized, at the latest, at 8:53 a.m., when Smith’s questions changed from general questions about defendant’s or P’s identity, to more probing questions about what … Continue reading
D.Mass.: Use of confidential taxpayer information to conduct immigration arrests and entries is enjoined
The use of confidential taxpayer information by ICE for immigration raids without any statutorily required procedures is enjoined. There is also the problem of no judicial warrant from judicial officer, just an immigration judge if at all. Cmty. Econ. Dev. … Continue reading
NPR & AP: ICE can’t make warrantless arrests in Oregon unless there’s risk of escape, judge rules
NPR: ICE can’t make warrantless arrests in Oregon unless there’s risk of escape, judge rules via AP (“U.S. immigration agents in Oregon must stop arresting people without warrants unless there’s a likelihood of escape, a federal judge ruled Wednesday. U.S. … Continue reading
W.D.Tex.: Arias deportation stayed, habeas granted, citing 4A and Declaration of Independence
Arias v. Noem, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 20726 (W.D. Tex. Jan. 31, 2026) [they are detained in Texas]: Before the Court is the petition of asylum seeker Adrian Conejo Arias and his five-year-old son for protection of the Great Writ … Continue reading
NYT: ICE Expands Power of Agents to Arrest People Without Warrants
NYT: ICE Expands Power of Agents to Arrest People Without Warrants by Hamed Aleaziz & Charlie Savage (“An internal memo changed the standard from whether people are unlikely to show up for hearings to whether they could leave the scene.”) … Continue reading
E.D.Pa.: The exclusionary rule doesn’t apply to grand jury evidence
Under Calandra (1974), there’s no basis for dismissing an indictment because it might be based on an illegal search. The search was valid anyway because it was based on the consenter’s apparent authority. United States v. Jones, 2026 U.S. Dist. … Continue reading
MS.now: Federal immigration agents keep shooting at drivers. We tracked 15 cases since July.
MS.now: Federal immigration agents keep shooting at drivers. We tracked 15 cases since July. By David Noriega & Kay Guerrero (“After each shooting, federal agencies claimed the drivers tried to ram agents with their vehicles. But the claim often falls … Continue reading
AP: Immigration officers assert sweeping power to enter homes without a judge’s warrant, memo says
AP: Immigration officers assert sweeping power to enter homes without a judge’s warrant, memo says by Rebecca Santana: Federal immigration officers are asserting sweeping power to forcibly enter people’s homes without a judge’s warrant, according to an internal Immigration and … Continue reading
AP: What to know about the warrants most immigration agents use to make arrests
AP: What to know about the warrants most immigration agents use to make arrests by Safiyah Riddle and Valerie Gonzalez:
N.D.N.Y.: Def’s immigration arrest was unreasonable and the product is suppressed
Defendant’s immigration arrest was unreasonable and the product is suppressed. United States v. Juarez-Lopez, 2025 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 269401 (N.D.N.Y. Dec. 18, 2025)*:
WaPo: ICE shift in tactics leads to soaring number of at-large arrests, data shows
WaPo: ICE shift in tactics leads to soaring number of at-large arrests, data shows by Marianne LeVine, Emmanuel Martinez & Álvaro Valiño (“The agency has moved away from focusing on arresting migrants at local jails to tracking them down in … Continue reading
CA3: Going into a well-known drug house for 2 minutes was RS for stop
Defendant was frequenting a well-known drug house. He went in for less than two minutes and came out. The stop was with reasonable suspicion. The patdown revealed a wad of cash by plain feel. United States v. Thomas, 2025 U.S. … Continue reading