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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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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: Franks doctrine
N.D.Ill.: Removing drugs from a package with an already issued anticipatory warrant and not telling court wasn’t material to PC
There was no material falsity in the affidavit for the search warrant which mentioned 58 prior international shipments to defendant’s place. Specifically, the drugs were removed from the package for the anticipatory warrant and replaced with fake stuff after the … Continue reading
E.D.N.C.: Defendant doesn’t get additional discovery in his quest to get a Franks hearing
Defendant doesn’t get additional discovery in his quest to get a Franks hearing. He has the burden of going forward and of proof. And, even if what he says is true, the probable cause isn’t sufficiently undermined. United States v. … Continue reading
OH5: Officer doesn’t need to be able to quote a statute in court to issue a ticket for violation of it
Even if the officer had an ulterior motive for defendant’s stop, it was based on probable cause of a traffic offense. The fact the officer couldn’t quote the statute in court doesn’t show that the stop was unreasonable or without … Continue reading
NJ: Trial court misapplied Franks without def even pleading Franks on an arrest warrant
The trial court erred in excising part of the affidavit for arrest on its description of the video of a shooting. Defendant chose not to file a Franks motion, and the video description shows that a person fired a gun … Continue reading
D.Nev.: Omission of CI’s felony conviction and motive to provide information justifies Franks hearing
“As further explained below, because the investigating detective’s omission of a tipster’s felony conviction for an offense bearing on his truthfulness in her affidavit supporting her application for a search warrant that led to the discovery of evidence on that … Continue reading
N.D.Tex.: Not material to not mention def’s state of mind hours before the occurrence
Defendant claimed a Franks violation from the officer’s failure to include things that were true about defendant before things went south that night. It wasn’t material to defendant’s state of mind at the time of the occurrence. United States v. … Continue reading
CA1: Ptf shows apparent Franks violation to survive SJ in § 1983 case
Defendants’ grant of summary judgment in a § 1983 case is reversed for a Franks violation in a theft case where plaintiff had a power of attorney over the property and the officer knew it and failed to disclose it … Continue reading
OH11: Failure to provide an inventory after a search is ministerial and not a fundamental right
“Even presuming no inventory was completed or provided to Thompson, however, this did not result in prejudice or provide any grounds for relief. It has been held that ‘the preparation and return of an inventory is ministerial’ and ‘does not … Continue reading
W.D.Pa.: Even if the one challenged sentence in the SW affidavit was stricken under Franks, PC would still exist
Defendant challenged one sentence in the affidavit as a Franks violation, but it doesn’t even appear to be false. Moreover, even if that sentence were stricken, there still would be probable cause, and he fails in his burden of proof. … Continue reading
CA11: Officer’s alleged lies to get arrest warrant denies QI
“With that in mind, we affirm the district court’s denial of qualified immunity. As indicated above, we accept for purposes of this appeal that Gill falsified information in the affidavits supporting his arrest warrants and therefore, he would not have … Continue reading
N.D.Ind.: The encounter started as consensual because the officer approached from the side to a parked car; RS developed
The encounter with the officer was not a seizure. She was parked five spaces away from defendant’s car and off to the side. When talking to defendant she saw a meth pipe in plain view. “The parties do not dispute … Continue reading
IL: The scope of consent to search a car was exceeded, but it was because PC had developed
Officers exceeded the scope of defendant’s consent, but, by the time they did, they had probable cause under the automobile exception to search further. People v. Davis, 2019 IL App (1st) 160408, 2019 Ill. App. LEXIS 875 (Sept. 23, 2019),* … Continue reading
CA1 affirms suppression order; reforming affidavit after Franks hearing shows no nexus to def’s house
The affidavit for the search warrant, reformed after a Franks hearing, did not establish probable cause to search defendant’s home. The affidavit did not set forth facts showing defendant had a history of drug dealing to permit an inference that … Continue reading
D.Idaho: Failure to tell USMJ that a trash pull came up empty wasn’t material when there was more that did show PC; wouldn’t have changed outcome
Omission to tell the USMJ that a trash search of defendant’s house came up empty didn’t undermine the other probable cause, wouldn’t have changed the outcome, and wasn’t a Franks issue. The same here about defendant’s alleged travels: Omissions don’t … Continue reading
S.D.Fla.: Claim USCG couldn’t stop def waived by guilty plea
Defendant’s claim that the U.S. Coast Guard had no jurisdiction to stop him was waived by his guilty plea. Munoz v. United States, 2019 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 190095 (S.D. Fla. Oct. 31, 2019).* Defendant doesn’t get a Franks hearing because … Continue reading
N.D.Ill.: Franks challenge requires there was a SW
Defense counsel wasn’t ineffective for not seeking a Franks hearing where there was no search warrant in the first place. Freeman v. United States, 2019 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 187171 (N.D. Ill. Oct. 29, 2019). Defendant’s general consent to search a … Continue reading
AZ: Protective sweep that produced a bullet casing was unjustified (but harmless)
Defendant has standing to challenge the search of a mobile home he had rented even though he had not fully moved in, and the trial court erred in concluding otherwise. The state’s argument the entry into the mobile home required … Continue reading
E.D.Ky.: Paraphrasing def’s jail calls on hearsay without affiant actually listening to them isn’t a Franks violation
A full forensic search of defendant’s cell phone was authorized by the affidavit which was attached to the search warrant. There were admissions from the defendant on jail calls to others that were reported to the police. The paraphrasing the … Continue reading
MO: Def’s blood draw while he was unconscious was proper under Mitchell
Defendant was unconscious after a single car accident and he smelled of alcohol. There was probable cause and the blood draw did not violate the Fourth Amendment under Mitchell v. Wisconsin. State v. Gray, 2019 Mo. App. LEXIS 1671 (Oct. … Continue reading