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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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)
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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
TN: Citizen informant’s call describing vehicle and LPN involved in apparent drug deal was RS
Citizen informant’s call that a neighbor was dealing drugs out of his house and describing the comings and goings and the LPN and description of the last car was reasonable suspicion for that car’s stop. State v. Foster, 2016 Tenn. … Continue reading
WI: Where there was a bona fide community caretaking entry because of blood outside and inside a house, the smell of marijuana didn’t negate the exigency
The warrantless search of defendant’s home including a room with a locked, blood-spattered door, was reasonable under the community caretaking function. In light of all the facts that an officer had to consider, the blood outside the house, inside the … Continue reading
OH6: A 911 call of gunshots in an apartment and blood seen on a man’s shirt was exigency
A 911 call of gunshots in an apartment and blood seen on a man’s shirt was exigency. “In this case, the facts establish that Toledo police officers responded to a 911 call wherein the caller said that someone was yelling … Continue reading
W.D.Mo.: General description of attacker here was a complete lack of PC for arrest
Defendant was searched incident to arrest for a rape. There, however, was a complete lack of probable cause for his arrest, and the search is suppressed. He was only the same general height and description of the attacker, and he … Continue reading
NY Bronx: State’s request for def’s DNA came too late under discovery statute
The state’s argument that defendant doesn’t have a Fifth Amendment privilege in his DNA is a straw man not even argued by the defense. He does have a Fourth Amendment right, and the state’s request for DNA here was far … Continue reading
IN: State failed to show standard inventory procedures were followed
“Officer Greathouse’s testimony was insufficient to prove the inventory search he performed of Rhodes’ vehicle complied with official police policy. Because the State did not present evidence of police procedure, the search violated Rhodes’ Fourth Amendment protection from unreasonable search … Continue reading
D.Minn.: RS and PC as to a car doesn’t require knowing the name of driver
Reasonable suspicion that a vehicle was involved in a crime didn’t require that officers have knowledge of who the driver was. Here, the RS ripened to PC so the length of the stop didn’t matter. The car search was justified … Continue reading
MA: Detailed description of car involved in two robberies near in time and location to when it was seen was PC
The officer had a wealth of information for probable cause to stop and search defendant’s car for two robberies. The fact that six hours elapsed between the two didn’t make the first one stale. Defendant’s argument the officers acted in … Continue reading
WaPo: Radley Balko’s ‘The Watch’ Blog – Federal judge: Drinking tea, shopping at a gardening store is probable cause for a SWAT raid on your home
WaPo: Radley Balko’s ‘The Watch’ Blog – Federal judge: Drinking tea, shopping at a gardening store is probable cause for a SWAT raid on your home: Yes, merely shopping at a gardening store could make you the target of a … Continue reading
N.D.Cal.: 55 day delay in getting cell phone SW didn’t matter because this was a supervised release revo proceeding, and the exclusionary rule wouldn’t apply
Defendant’s cell phone was seized in an arrest for loitering for pimping. After his probation officer went back and forth with the police, he declined to search it under defendant’s search condition, and 55 days elapsed, and a search warrant … Continue reading
D.Minn.: Even if def’s stop was without RS, his flight and subsequent traffic violations were an independent basis for arrest
Officers had reasonable suspicion to approach defendant’s vehicle for being engaged in a pending drug sale. “However, even if officers lacked reasonable suspicion to support the stop of defendant’s vehicle, the Court finds that defendant’s attempt to flee from law … Continue reading
PA: Plain view of possession of a firearm is RS to see if the person is licensed or not
“‘[P]ossession of a concealed firearm in public is sufficient to create a reasonable suspicion that the individual may be dangerous, such that an officer can approach the individual and briefly detain him in order to investigate whether the person is … Continue reading
Three on fair probability of evidence in the home: two for drugs, other for counterfeit wine
The affidavit for the search warrant showed a fair probability that drugs would be found at defendant’s home, based largely on the officer’s experience that drug dealers usually do keep it at home. United States v. Brandon, 2015 U.S. Dist. … Continue reading
W.D.N.Y.: Smell of burnt MJ didn’t justify searching all four occupants or the whole car
“[T]he smell of burnt marijuana in the vehicle, without more, [doesn’t] provide[] probable cause to search each of the occupants for marijuana.” Otherwise it’s guilt by association. The officers needed to do more to isolate the smell of marijuana as … Continue reading
OH11: “minor misdemeanor” MJ charge under state law doesn’t support search incident
Defendant was stopped for a brake light violation and smelled marijuana on defendant. Since all the officer had was a “minor misdemeanor” under state law, a search incident of defendant that involved three searches of his person was unreasonable. It … Continue reading
LA2: It isn’t required that occurrence of a crime actually happened, but it is really important to PC
“Although certainty of knowledge of the commission of a particular crime is frequently an important factor in the determination of probable cause, probable cause may exist when the commission of a crime has not been definitely established, but is reasonably … Continue reading
DE: Being an alleged heroin dealer is nexus to search the alleged dealer’s cell phone
When the state shows probable cause for a search warrant for defendant’s house because he was a suspected heroin dealer, there is also probable cause for a search of defendant’s cell phone because cell phones are used to arrange drug … Continue reading
PA: The best evidence rule does not apply to establishing probable cause
In establishing probable cause, the best evidence rule under Rule 1002 & 1004(a) did not apply to a still photograph of a truck that was taken from a security videotape that was erased and then taped over by a camera … Continue reading