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- TX: If electronic search was illegal, it was harmless
- CA: Two SWs for ballots alleging no crime
- GA: Raising particularity in half of one sentence of argument isn’t a presentation of the issue
- Reason: Homeland Security Is Monitoring Activists Building Anti-Flock Tech
- W.D.Pa.: Def can’t repackage a losing 4A standing claim into a due process claim
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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 -
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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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www.fd.org
Federal Law Enforcement Training Center Resources
FBI Domestic Investigations and Operations Guide (2008) (pdf)
DEA Agents Manual (2002) (download)
DOJ Computer Search Manual (2009) (pdf)
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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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: Computer and cloud searches
Cal.2d: SW for records and computers in 23 year old cold case was not stale, and GFE applied
This is a 1986 cold murder case solved in 2009 by DNA involving the killing by an LAPD officer of the wife of her lover at the time. All the forensics were retested with current DNA techniques and sent to … Continue reading
WaPo: New article: “Executing Warrants for Digital Evidence: The Case for Use Restrictions on Nonresponsive Data”
WaPo: New article: “Executing Warrants for Digital Evidence: The Case for Use Restrictions on Nonresponsive Data” by Orin Kerr: I recently posted a new draft article, “Executing Warrants for Digital Evidence: The Case for Use Restrictions on Nonresponsive Data.” The … Continue reading
IN: Car’s GPS device protected under Riley; SW required
A vehicle’s GPS device is not a container subject to search under the automobile exception. It contains personal data, and it is akin to a cell phone, and a warrant is required under Riley. Wertz v. State, 2015 Ind. App. … Continue reading
Reuters: En banc 2nd Circuit to clarify when computer seizures are unconstitutional
Reuters: En banc 2nd Circuit to clarify when computer seizures are unconstitutional by Alison Frankel: (Reuters) – The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals seems to be eager to decide when, if ever, the federal government has the right to … Continue reading
N.D.Ind.: Incorporation of affidavit saves a general warrant for computers and a Facebook account
Defendant’s Facebook post “involved in to kill public officials and destroy government buildings,” including the obligatory disclaimer of exercising free speech rights, led to three search warrants. The warrant was for computers and electronics but it didn’t specify what the … Continue reading
NYLJ: How Has Digital Ubiquity Affected Fourth Amendment Law?
NYLJ: How Has Digital Ubiquity Affected Fourth Amendment Law? by Richard Raysman & Peter Brown:
PA: Computer file that had to be opened was not in “plain view”
Riley on cell phone searches applies to computer searches. Defendant had a reasonable expectation of privacy in his files. He took his computer to Circuit City to have a DVD burner put on his computer, and the store technician decided … Continue reading
New Law Review Article: Botnet Takedowns and the Fourth Amendment
New Law Review Article: Botnet Takedowns and the Fourth Amendment by Sam Zeitlin, 90 NYU Law Rev. No. 2 (May 2015). Abstract:
CA9: No special protocol required for computer SW, but courts must be vigilant on review
No special protocol required for a computer search warrant, but vigilance of the court is expected in review to protect against overreaching. Also, the least intrusive measures are required. United States v. Nessland, 2015 U.S. App. LEXIS 7360 (9th cir. … Continue reading
Wyo.Law.: Digital Evidence and the Fourth Amendment: United States v. Ganias and Judicial Recognition of the ‘Right to Deletion’
Blake Anthony Klinkner, Digital Evidence and the Fourth Amendment: United States v. Ganias and Judicial Recognition of the ‘Right to Deletion’, 52 Wyo. Law. (April 2015): In United States v. Ganias, the United States Court of Appeals for the Second … Continue reading
OH: Computer search warrant was so overbroad that good faith can’t save it
The affiant negligently usurped the inference drawing authority of the magistrate [not to mention the magistrate not doing his or her job either in even signing this warrant], and that affects the probable cause finding. Defendant argued particularity for the … Continue reading
CA6: PC for a cell phone SW shown because it was used in a fraud case; computer search standards applied and satisfied
In a fraud case, probable cause was shown to search a cell phone for both evidence of the fraud and text messages where the co-conspirators were communicating with each other. Nexus was shown because defendant was using his cell phone … Continue reading
Techdirt: California Legislators Pushing Warrant Requirement For All Access To Electronic Information, Including That Obtained By Stingrays
Techdirt: California Legislators Pushing Warrant Requirement For All Access To Electronic Information, Including That Obtained By Stingrays by Tim Cushing: Good news from California: a bill requiring warrants for Stingray device usage (among other things) has passed out of a … Continue reading
D.Nev.: SW request for Apple to unlock iPads and iPhones denied as a general search and without search protocol
The government’s request for a search warrant for Apple to unlock and override passwords on four iPads and two iPhones is denied. The search warrant application lacks probable cause and no search warrant protocol for electronic devices. It amounts to … Continue reading
CA1: There was RS for the border search of defendant’s computer and cell phones
Defendant made his fifth short trip from Puerto Rico to Colombia in a few months, and he was flagged for secondary border screening. His older but operational laptop had no data on it. Questions about his trip made no real … Continue reading
Int’t Business Times: Rule 41 Change Could Allow FBI To Get Warrants To Remotely Search Suspects’ Computers Without Notice
Int’t Business Times: Rule 41 Change Could Allow FBI To Get Warrants To Remotely Search Suspects’ Computers Without Notice by Julia Glum: The Department of Justice recently edged closer to a rule change that would allow the FBI to track … Continue reading
The Register (UK): Google strongly opposes plans to let ANY US COURT authorise digi-snoops
The Register (UK): Google strongly opposes plans to let ANY US COURT authorise digi-snoops: Google has strongly opposed US government plans to expand federal powers to authorise remote searches of digital data – claiming in a letter the powers will … Continue reading