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- GA: Raising particularity in half of one sentence of argument isn’t a presentation of the issue
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- GA: No case says SW required to ask for cell phone password
- VA: Body cam video of valid arrest would not be suppressed
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Feedspot’s Best Legal Blogs and Websites 2023-2026,
also, firm website Top 90 Criminal Law Blogs 2026 -
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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 -
Latest Slip Opinions:
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Foreign Intell.Surv.Ct.
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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
Privacy Foundation
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NACDL’s Domestic Drone Information Center
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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: Computer and cloud searches
ABAJ: Google vows to fight search warrant seeking the names of everyone who Googled crime victim
ABAJ: Google vows to fight search warrant seeking the names of everyone who Googled crime victim by Debra Cassens Weiss: Google says it will fight a search warrant seeking information about anyone who searched the name of a financial crime … Continue reading
CA3: 5A no bar to using All Writs Act and contempt power to order target to decrypt hard drive
The government can use the All Writs Act to get the target of a search to decrypt a hard drive because it does not violate the Fifth Amendment. Challenging the merits of the underlying order in a civil contempt isn’t … Continue reading
Kerr: Oregon AG’s Office argues to State SCT that ex ante search restrictions on computer warrants not ok.
Orin Kerr on Twitter: Oregon AG’s Office argues to State SCT that ex ante search restrictions on computer warrants not ok. State v Mansor https://orinkerrblog.files.wordpress.com/2017/03/2017_wl_944311.pdf …
The Hill: ACLU challenges warrant to search Facebook page of Dakota Access opponents
The Hill: ACLU challenges warrant to search Facebook page of Dakota Access opponents by Morgan Chalfant: The American Civil Liberties Union is moving to quash a police warrant granted to search data on a Facebook page of a group protesting … Continue reading
EFF: Secret Court Orders Aren’t Blank Checks for General Electronic Searches
EFF: Secret Court Orders Aren’t Blank Checks for General Electronic Searches by Mark Rumhold:
OH8: Taking pictures of sex with a minor with a cell phone supports SW for home computer for storage
The child victim’s claim that defendant used his cell phone to take pictures of the two of them having sex logically supported a search warrant for defendant’s computers in his house because of the ease with which images can be … Continue reading
techdirt: Judge: FBI’s NIT Warrant Invalid And IP Addresses Do Have An Expectation Of Privacy, But No Suppression Granted
techdirt: Judge: FBI’s NIT Warrant Invalid And IP Addresses Do Have An Expectation Of Privacy, But No Suppression Granted by Tim Cushing: Thanks to the FBI’s one-to-many NIT warrant, which was issued in Virginia but reached thousands of computers all … Continue reading
CO: SW for things that could transmit pictures to a computer fairly included a digital camera
The search warrant was for digital images and was for computers, storage media, and things that could transmit pictures to the computer. That fairly included defendant’s digital camera. People v. Raehal, 2017 COA 18, 2017 Colo. App. LEXIS 199 (Feb. … Continue reading
CAAF: Military search authorization for laptop based on PC for cell phone was without PC or GFE
Defendant was accused of using his cell phone to take naked pictures of other soldiers in the shower and latrine. Defendant’s cell phone was on his rack with his laptop. The search authorization included defendant’s laptop, but there was no … Continue reading
WaPo: What’s missing in the government’s briefs in the Playpen warrant cases
WaPo: What’s missing in the government’s briefs in the Playpen warrant cases by Orin Kerr: As regular readers know, dozens of federal district courts around the country have ruled on motions to suppress evidence in cases arising from the Playpen … Continue reading
WI: Probation condition against possession of a computer gives the PO power to search one found
Defendant had arson and sex offender convictions, and a term of probation was no computers without approval. They found a computer with live modems at his house, and he denied that the big computer worked, but he had a laptop. … Continue reading
MA: There is no requirement of a search protocol in the SW but it is advisable to restrain execution in computer searches
An IP address as a source of child pornography provides sufficient probable cause and nexus to search the subscriber’s home and computer. There are no search protocols for the warrant but it is advisable to use them. An administrative subpoena … Continue reading
LA5: Typo as to IP source in CP case was irrelevant to existence of probable cause
A typographical error as to defendant’s internet provider did not undermine the probable cause for the search warrant for his child pornography on his computer. It has nothing to do with the probable cause. State v. Shiell, 2016 La. App. … Continue reading
CA5: The length of computer search didn’t make it unreasonable where def was a lawyer and taint team had to do first review
Defendant was a lawyer who took his computer in to have the data on the hard drive switched to a new computer. The service guy doing the job noticed file names suggestive of child pornography and he saw at least … Continue reading
CA8: Supervised release term of “random inspections of his computer’s internet and email usage history” reasonably justified search of def’s computer
Supervised release term of “random inspections of his computer’s internet and email usage history” reasonably justified search of defendant’s computer. United States v. McCoy, 2017 U.S. App. LEXIS 1695 (8th Cir. Jan. 31, 2017):
Cal.6th: Broad electronic search probation condition was justified by the crime
The defendant juvenile took pictures of his having sex with a girl he was in school with and then he blackmailed her. He was found delinquent under the juvenile law for possession of child pornography and extortion. The broad probation … Continue reading
N.D.Cal.: Documents seized beyond SW terms in computer search suppressed
The government seized documents in a computer search that are outside the warrant because it didn’t comply with a Comprehensive Drug Testing computer search protocol, but it declines to remove them from its computer image file because it would taint … Continue reading
EFF Asks Massachusetts High Court to Require Clear Limits Before Allowing Searches of Digital Devices and Information
EFF Asks Massachusetts High Court to Require Clear Limits Before Allowing Searches of Digital Devices and Information by Stephanie Lacambra: Along with several other advocacy groups, EFF signed on to an amicus brief this week in the case of the … Continue reading
Dallas News: The FBI ran a child porn site to catch predators, and now the accused are crying foul
Dallas News: The FBI ran a child porn site to catch predators, and now the accused are crying foul by Kevin Krause: When Daryl Glenn Pawlak logged into a large child pornography website and downloaded images using his work computer, … Continue reading