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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 (26,730+ on WordPress as of 12/31/23) -
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Fourth Amendment cases,
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Congressional Research Service:
--Electronic Communications Privacy Act (2012)
--Overview of the 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: Digital privacy
Vice: Police Are Tapping Into Ring Cameras to Expand Surveillance Network In Mississippi
Vice: Police Are Tapping Into Ring Cameras to Expand Surveillance Network In Mississippi by Edward Ongweso Jr (“The police department in Jackson, Mississippi is partnering with two companies to stream surveillance footage from Ring cameras in a 45-day pilot program.”)
Jurist: Michigan voters approve warrant requirement for electronic data searches
Jurist: Michigan voters approve warrant requirement for electronic data searches by Daniel Klapper (“Michigan voters Tuesday approved an amendment to the state constitution that will require law enforcement to get a warrant for electronic data searches. The amendment prohibits searches … Continue reading
NYTimes: The Police Can Probably Break Into Your Phone
NYTimes: The Police Can Probably Break Into Your Phone (“At least 2,000 law enforcement agencies have tools to get into encrypted smartphones, according to new research, and they are using them far more than previously known.”)
The Intercept: Stop-and-frisk Never Really Ended. Now It’s Gone Digital.
The Intercept: Stop-and-frisk Never Really Ended. Now It’s Gone Digital. by Alice Speri (“A federal class-action lawsuit accuses New York police of unconstitutionally detaining people in order to run their IDs.”) If the stop has to be based on reasonable … Continue reading
CNET: Google is giving data to police based on search keywords, court docs show
CNET: Google is giving data to police based on search keywords, court docs show by Alfred Ng (“Court records in an arson case show that Google gave away data on people who searched for a specific address.”)
Vice: Motherboard: The IRS Is Being Investigated for Using Location Data Without a Warrant
Vice: Motherboard: The IRS Is Being Investigated for Using Location Data Without a Warrant (“The IRS used smartphone location data from a contractor to try and track Americans without a warrant.”)
techdirt: DHS Probably Didn’t Clone Phones To Intercept Protesters’ Communications
techdirt: DHS Probably Didn’t Clone Phones To Intercept Protesters’ Communications by Tim Cushing:
Vox: Recode: Amazon’s surveillance cameras fly now — which is unsettling
Vox: Recode: Amazon’s surveillance cameras fly now — which is unsettling (“Amazon has announced a new way for consumers to surveil their own homes: a camera-equipped drone that connects to Ring security systems. Ring, which Amazon owns, has a history … Continue reading
EFF: Proctoring Apps Subject Students to Unnecessary Surveillance
EFF: Proctoring Apps Subject Students to Unnecessary Surveillance by Jason Kelley & Lindsay Oliver (“With COVID-19 forcing millions of teachers and students to rethink in-person schooling, this moment is ripe for an innovation in learning. Unfortunately, many schools have simply … Continue reading
Townhall: One of America’s Largest Cities Is Using a 1984 Tactic to Find Quarantine Violators
Townhall: One of America’s Largest Cities Is Using a 1984 Tactic to Find Quarantine Violators by Beth Baumann:
Gizmodo: Law Enforcement Is Buying Its Way Into Our Breaches
Gizmodo: Law Enforcement Is Buying Its Way Into Our Breaches by Shoshana Wodinsky:
WaPo: California begins enforcing digital privacy law, despite calls for delay
WaPo: California begins enforcing digital privacy law, despite calls for delay by Rachel Lerman (“California’s privacy law, often called the broadest law for digital privacy in the United States, can finally be enforced starting Wednesday. And despite industry calls for … Continue reading
Vox: The police want your phone data. Here’s what they can get — and what they can’t.
Vox: The police want your phone data. Here’s what they can get — and what they can’t. By Sara Morrison (“Phones hold gigabytes of potential evidence, but the government’s ability to access them depends on a patchwork of court decisions … Continue reading
gizmodo: Feds Find Fourth Amendment Workaround, Buy Phone Locations From Marketing Firms
gizmodo: Feds Find Fourth Amendment Workaround, Buy Phone Locations From Marketing Firms by Dell Cameron (“Sidestepping the need to obtain a search warrant, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has reportedly been accessing phone location data belonging to millions of … Continue reading
WaPo: How William Barr could make everyone’s iPhone more vulnerable
WaPo: How William Barr could make everyone’s iPhone more vulnerable:
Lawfare: Apple vs FBI: Pensacola Isn’t San Bernardino
Lawfare: Apple vs FBI: Pensacola Isn’t San Bernardino by Nicholas Weaver:
NYTimes: Apple Takes a (Cautious) Stand Against Opening a Killer’s iPhones
NYTimes: Apple Takes a (Cautious) Stand Against Opening a Killer’s iPhones By Jack Nicas and Katie Benner (“The Silicon Valley giant is preparing for a legal fight over encryption, even as it works to reduce tensions with the Justice Department.”)
WaPo: At CES, Apple, Facebook and Amazon are preaching privacy. Don’t believe the hype.
WaPo: At CES, Apple, Facebook and Amazon are preaching privacy. Don’t believe the hype. by Geoffrey A. Fowler
Pacific Legal Foundation: With 5G arriving, the Supreme Court needs to rule on what digital privacy means
Pacific Legal Foundation: With 5G arriving, the Supreme Court needs to rule on what digital privacy means by Daniel Woislaw:
WBUR: How California’s New Privacy Law Could Change The Internet
WBUR: How California’s New Privacy Law Could Change The Internet (“This week, on Jan. 1, the California Consumer Privacy Act takes effect, requiring tech companies to disclose what data they collect on their users and what they’re doing with it.”)