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- CA8: Def’s 20 prior arrests helped show voluntariness of consent
- TX1: No standing to challenge seizure of ketamine off co-def, but PC was lacking for his own arrest
- KS: 13 days pole camera surveillance violated no REP
- E.D.Va.: WaPo reporter’s SW was overbroad and 1A protected
- CAAF: GFE applies to cell phone’s geolocation data because of substantial basis for the search authorization
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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)
--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: Reasonable expectation of privacy
CA2: NY Family Court orders can suffice as SWs
“New York Family Court orders provide an independent basis for police officers to enter peoples’ homes. We have repeatedly recognized that, ‘[i]n child-abuse investigations, a Family Court order is equivalent to a search warrant for Fourth Amendment purposes.’ Southerland v. … Continue reading
E.D.Tenn.: Leaving suitcase in an open grassy area is a loss of a REP in it
Defendant left his suitcase in an open grassy area, and that was a waiver any reasonable expectation of privacy in it. See United States v. Wilson, 984 F. Supp. 2d 676 (E.D. Ky. 2013) (leaving suitcase in a cemetery was … Continue reading
N.D.W.Va.: A pipe in a car that could have legitimate uses still was incriminating enough for plain view
A pipe logically and usually used for smoking pot was seized in plain view because its incriminating nature was immediately apparent. The fact it could be used for legal substances doesn’t detract from that. United States v. Runner, 2020 U.S. … Continue reading
S.D.Fla.: While one’s roof is on the curtilage, it lacks a REP
Defendant’s roof was not a place with a reasonable expectation of privacy despite the fact it was on the curtilage (decided in the context of an ineffective assistance of counsel claim). Davis v. United States, 2020 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 201562 … Continue reading
TX5: HIPAA doesn’t create REP in blood toxicology for medical treatment later used in DUI
HIPAA doesn’t create a reasonable expectation of privacy in one’s blood sample obtained for medical treatment. HIPAA recognizes criminal process to obtain it. Consuelo v. State, 2020 Tex. App. LEXIS 8460 (Tex. App. – Dallas Oct. 27, 2020). Any lack … Continue reading
CA7: Ptf was a trespasser who had no REP
Plaintiff as a trespasser had no reasonable expectation of privacy to make a Fourth Amendment complaint. “Just as a trespasser has no reasonable expectation of privacy in the property, a trespasser also lacks a possessory interest in the property. The … Continue reading
D.Mass.: Def had no REP in his employer’s information he was accused of taking
Defendant is charged with accessing and taking his employer’s information for the purpose of setting up a rival company doing the same thing. His motion to suppress the information is denied because he has no reasonable expectation of privacy in … Continue reading
CA11: Carpenter doesn’t require SW for prescription drug monitoring program records
In this pill mill case, Carpenter provides no protection for third party records and information in the Florida Prescription Drug Monitoring Program (PDMP). United States v. Gayden, 2020 U.S. App. LEXIS 32030 (11th Cir. Oct. 9, 2020):
CA6: No REP in talking to a friend who was recording it
No matter how much one trusts a friend, there is no reasonable expectation of privacy that the friend won’t have recorded it and revealed it (Hoffa and White). Courser v. Mich. House of Representatives, 2020 U.S. App. LEXIS 31917 (6th … Continue reading
D.Kan.: Surreptitiously video recording a VA doctor’s exam does not violate 4A
The VA video recorded a physical exam of defendant as a part of a fraud investigation into obtaining VA benefits. Defendant had no reasonable expectation of privacy against recording because the examiner could have reported everything in detail anyway. United … Continue reading
W.D.Ky.: Def’s “Twitter page is rife with references to drug dealing and weapon possession” and that was PC
Defendant’s “Twitter page is rife with references to drug dealing and weapon possession. Lewis’ prior relationship with Doaty, coupled with Doaty’s own statements, corroborated her information and made it sufficiently reliable to justify a search of his vehicle.” It was … Continue reading
techdirt: Fourth Circuit Appeals Court Seems Skeptical That Baltimore’s Aerial Surveillance System Violates The Fourth Amendment
techdirt: Fourth Circuit Appeals Court Seems Skeptical That Baltimore’s Aerial Surveillance System Violates The Fourth Amendment by Tim Cushing (“The legal fight over Baltimore’s aerial surveillance system continues. Airplanes armed with powerful cameras fly constantly over the city, allowing law … Continue reading
St. Louis Public Radio: Baltimore’s Aerial Surveillance Could Offer Preview For St. Louis
St. Louis Public Radio: Baltimore’s Aerial Surveillance Could Offer Preview For St. Louis by Emily Woodbury (“Last October on St. Louis on the Air, the CEO of the Ohio-based company Persistent Surveillance Systems described his wish to bring the company’s … Continue reading
CA11: Carpenter isn’t retroactive; successor habeas denied
Defendant’s CSLI claim can’t be brought as a successor habeas petition. Carpenter isn’t retroactive. In re Witherspoon, 2020 U.S. App. LEXIS 29717 (11th Cir. Sept. 17, 2020). Defendant was in a stolen vehicle and had a backpack in it while … Continue reading
D.N.H.: State liquor agents’ entry into public areas of licensee was reasonable as under administrative authority
NH state liquor agents didn’t violate the Fourth Amendment by entering public space of a regulated establishment to issue verbal warnings. The state supreme court has already held that liquor licensees were highly regulated businesses. E. Coast Serv. Indus. Co. … Continue reading
WA: Ruse text messages with known contact violated state REP
A ruse police text message exchange with defendant with one of his known contacts violated his reasonable expectation of privacy under the state constitution’s right of privacy. State v. Bowman, 2020 Wash. App. LEXIS 2463 (Sept. 8, 2020):
D.Ariz.: No REP in one’s criminal history from examination
There is no reasonable expectation of privacy in an inmate’s criminal history search that led to a detainer. Brink v. Herron, 2020 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 162680 (D. Ariz. Aug. 7, 2020). Defendant’s application for a successor 2255 based on defense … Continue reading
AK: Aerial surveillance of a residential backyard to photograph it with a telephoto lens violates the state constitution
Aerial surveillance of a residential backyard to photograph it with a telephoto lens violates the Alaska Constitution where the landowner took precautions to protect his privacy at ground-level. McKelvey v. State, 2020 Alas. App. LEXIS 71 (Sept. 4, 2020):
AR: No REP in camera planted in someone else’s bedroom
Defendant had no reasonable expectation of privacy in a camera planted for video voyeurism in someone else’s bedroom. Powell v. State, 2020 Ark. App. 371, 2020 Ark. App. LEXIS 416 (Sept. 2, 2020):
MT: Renter of person on probation isn’t subject to landlord’s probation search
Defendant rented an outbuilding as a residence from a person on probation. His separate room was not subject to the landlord’s probation search waiver. In addition, one doesn’t have to lock his residence to have a reasonable expectation of privacy … Continue reading