September 2026 S M T W T F S 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 Archives
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Recent Posts
- WaPo: Americans have turned against police cameras that track license plates, new survey shows
- W.D.Tex.: What is the duty of the neutral and detached magistrate?
- D.Me.: Yes, more investigation could have been done, but there’s still PC on what there was
- CA3: Brady doesn’t apply to SW materials
- E.D.Mich.: Person a cell phone was given to as gift could consent to search
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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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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
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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: Probable cause
CA8: Arguable probable cause for arrest gives QI
“The totality of the circumstances at the time of the arrest, as described above, were sufficient for Svajgl to believe that Nader had committed or was committing the offense of possessing child pornography.” Arguable probable cause is all that’s required … Continue reading
FL1: Entry into def’s backyard for “strong chemical smell” was without showing exigency and suppressed
Police entered defendant’s backyard based on a call about a strong chemical smell. He was grinding glass with a heavy tool. They saw two women and another man visible inside the shed. They ordered him out and then got defendant … Continue reading
OH8: Stop for flashing high beams was mistake of law and objectively reasonable under Heien
The state concedes that one flashing his high beams for one second twice 14 seconds apart at a vehicle in front of him for not moving is not a violation of the statute for unnecessarily driving on high beams. Nevertheless, … Continue reading
TX9: Def abandoned trailer he was living in along with all its contents
Defendant and his family were living in a trailer they abandoned. After a broken water line inside, the trailer and contents were damaged, and they moved out, apparently never to return. When the owner found the trailer, there was mold … Continue reading
N.D.Ohio: PC shown: “the Court is concerned with what the Affidavit actually contains, not what a critic thinks it should contain”
On the totality of circumstances, the information from the anonymous CI was adequately cooroborated to give probable cause. “Further, Defendant criticizes the Search Warrant for what it lacks — no mention of others residing at Property and no detail about … Continue reading
S.D.W.Va.: Officers falsely swore def’s friend “lived or stayed there”; she visited after a small heroin deal, and there was no PC at all
Defendant was visited by a friend after an $80 heroin sale. There was no nexus to defendant’s house by the friend who’d only visited a few times over a long period of time. The police also falsely swore that she … Continue reading
FL2: Search incident for being in a city park after hours unreasonable
A custodial arrest for being in a city park after closing time and a search incident was invalid. State law cautions against search incident for noncriminal violations. Nelson v. State, 2019 Fla. App. LEXIS 3159 (Fla. 2d DCA Mar. 1, … Continue reading
N.D.Ill.: Officer’s embellishments of drugs involved told to others didn’t undermine the real PC that existed to stop def
Defendant’s conversations were picked up on a wiretap and concerned his marijuana dealing and being a felon in possession of a firearm. Despite officer embellishments in other types of drugs defendant was involved in shared with other officers (heroin, etc.), … Continue reading
TN: CI’s drug information about def’s house “within previous 72 hours” not stale
A CI who’d been in defendant’s house reported that defendant had a quantity of marijuana for sale, and it was reported by the officer in the affidavit to have been within the previous 72 hours. Probable cause was shown for … Continue reading
CA6: State SW can be used to bring a federal prosection
A state search warrant, of course, can be used to initiate a federal prosecution. Dismissal of the state case in favor of federal prosecution is not res judicata. Moreover, the federal government isn’t a party in the state case. United … Continue reading
DE: No error in order denying production of a DNA warrant in an unrelated case without showing any relevance
There was no abuse of discretion in the trial court refusing to make the state produce a DNA affidavit and search warrant in another case not shown to be relevant here. White v. StateWhite v. StateWhite v. State, 2019 Del. … Continue reading
CA7: Entrapment defense isn’t relevant to whether controlled buy is PC; it’s a question for trial
Defendant’s assertion of entrapment in a controlled buy is a question for trial. It doesn’t negate the fact that the buy occurred and that probable cause exists. State v. Curtis, 2019-Ohio-499, 2019 Ohio App. LEXIS 514 (7th Dist. Jan. 25, … Continue reading
Two controlled buys: one not done right, one good
The search warrant was based on a controlled buy, but the CI doing the buy was controlled enough to know that what was acquired came from defendant. Therefore, probable cause is lacking, and the good faith exception won’t be applied. … Continue reading
E.D.Mich.: Affidavit’s misidentifying homeowner wasn’t material to the PC to search
Misidentifying the homeowner in the affidavit for the warrant isn’t material because a search warrant runs against the place and the evidence inside. “The identity of the supposedly-misidentified person is irrelevant to the finding of probable cause to search the … Continue reading
M.D.Tenn.: PC shown for govt to photograph tattoos on def
“It was reasonable and prudent for Magistrate Judge Brown to issue the search warrant based upon Agent Daniel’s affidavit because that affidavit established at least a ‘fair probability’ that tattoos evidencing affiliation with the Gangster Disciples would be found on … Continue reading
N.D.Okla.: “firearms are tangible objects of habitual retention” and that overcomes def’s staleness argument
“Officer Campbell averred that, based on her experience and training, she knows that firearms are tangible objects of habitual retention, and once a person acquires a firearm, he or she usually keeps said weapon for a long period of time.” … Continue reading
CA6: Officers who went to hospital room get QI on whether there was a REP in the shared room
Officers who visited plaintiff in his hospital room he shared with another were sued for allegedly violating his reasonable expectation of privacy. There is no clear controlling authority, and the officers get qualified immunity [and the issue goes undecided]. Bonds … Continue reading
D.Minn.: A narrative affidavit for SW is hardly “outrageous conduct” to seek to dismiss indictment
Obtaining a search warrant with a narrative affidavit, inter alia, is hardly outrageous governmental conduct warranting dismissal. United States v. Ortiz, 2019 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 17455 (D. Minn. Feb. 4, 2019).* Plaintiff’s excessive force claim against a probation search which … Continue reading
AK: SW for tenant space led to search of computer in landlord’s apt, and that was without PC
Computers are entitled to the same sensitive Fourth Amendment analysis that cell phones got in Riley. Here, Pohland was an Assistant AG of Alaska involved in labor relations matters for the state. McRoberts and her husband were tenants of hers, … Continue reading
E.D.Ky.: Disagreement with some of the facts of the alleged PC doesn’t undermine it; it might be relevant at trial
Defendant’s disagreement with some of the facts that led to his arrest didn’t undermine the probable cause and search incident. They may be relevant at trial, but probable cause still exists. United States v. Hawkins, 2019 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 12033 … Continue reading