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- OH2: Stop outside the officer’s jurisdiction doesn’t violate 4A
- RawStory Opinion: Trump just declared these parts of America are outside the Constitution (within 100 miles of any border)
- CA1: SW for iPhone 6S didn’t permit search of iPhone 13 despite same phone number
- CA7: It wasn’t a 4A violation to place a pole camera to look over def’s fence he built knowing he was under surveillance
- NM: Conflict of laws: NM exclusionary rule applies to TX 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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Congressional Research Service:
--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)
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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 suspicion
PA: Def driving from Delaware to Philly for cheesesteaks when he was broke added to RS
Driving from Delaware to Philadelphia to get cheesesteaks while the driver professing he can’t afford a speeding ticket with a few other “dubious” comments leads to reasonable suspicion to continue the stop. The trial court erred in suppressing. Commonwealth v. … Continue reading
D.Minn.: Consent to search cell phone was voluntary after def was told of right to refuse and revoke consent once given
Defendant consented to a seizure and search of his cell phone after being told of his right to refuse and to revoke consent at any time. United States v. Fairbanks, 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 210371 (D.Minn. Nov. 1, 2021). Plaintiff … Continue reading
ND: Federal tribal DTF officer could stop suspected DUI on state highway
“In light of the Supreme Court’s decision in Cooley, we conclude the federal law enforcement officer working as an agent for the tribal drug enforcement agency had jurisdiction to detain Suelzle for a reasonable time while awaiting a state officer … Continue reading
ID: Officer taking DL and handing it to another officer to check was a seizure requiring RS; anonymous CI was not corroborated
Reasonable suspicion was required when the officer retained defendant’s driver’s license by taking it, leaving her presence, and giving it to another officer to run a license check. Defendant was thus detained because a reasonable person in her position would … Continue reading
S.D.W.Va.: Def’s merely talking to an alleged shooter wasn’t RS
Defendant’s merely talking to an alleged shooter before his interaction with the police was not reasonable suspicion he was armed and dangerous. “The totality of the circumstances here does not support a reasonable suspicion that Defendant was armed and dangerous … Continue reading
C.D.Ill.: Entry onto def’s curtilage to investigate his weapon possession broadcast live on SnapChat was with RS and reasonable
Officers were regularly monitoring defendant’s SnapChat account and saw him in real time with a gun. He was a convicted felon. “The officers decided to go to the Residence to detain Banks on his porch to investigate whether he had … Continue reading
D.Minn.: Merely unlocking cell phone without looking in it is not a search
“[U]sing a passcode to unlock Defendant’s cellphone without exploring the contents of the phone does not constitute a search under the Fourth Amendment.” United States v. Jackson, 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 202192 (D.Minn. Oct. 20, 2021). The protective sweep was … Continue reading
N.D.Ohio: Providing the wrong rental agreement for the car led to more questions and then RS
“[I]t was reasonable for Trooper Burgett to suspect that criminal conduct was afoot. The stop was initially for a mere traffic infraction, but when Defendant Sanders provided the wrong rental agreement, things shifted. The incorrect rental agreement was a catalyst … Continue reading
D.Utah: PC not required for plain view’s “immediately apparent” element
Probable cause is not required for the “immediately apparent” element of plain view as defendant argues. Still, officers had it to seize his cell phones as involved in his alleged crime. The later issued search warrant for the devices was … Continue reading
MT: Person on the street talking to person in a car known for drug crimes in a drug crime area is not RS
The trial court erred in concluding that the protective pat-down search of defendant was justified under Terry and state law because being engaged with an unknown individual in an area where drug crimes had occurred in a vehicle associated with … Continue reading
M.D.Pa.: Doctor had no REP in hospital’s patient records
A doctor working at a hospital had no reasonable expectation of privacy in patient records in the hospital’s computer system. United States v. Evers, 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 200425 (M.D.Pa. Oct. 18, 2021). While a probationer is subject to broad … Continue reading
D.N.H.: Jardines implied license to approach front door doesn’t extend to back patio
An implied license to come to the front door, if it exists under Jardines, doesn’t permit officers coming to the back patio area on the curtilage. Here, however, the emergency aid exception applied, and there was no Fourth Amendment violation. … Continue reading
CA8: RS supported stop from GPS tracker placed with robbery loot
Defendant’s challenge to the reliability of GPS information for a stop of a robbery suspect on reasonable suspicion is rejected. He was accused of robbing a cell phone store, and a GPS tracker left with him. It was reasonable to … Continue reading
N.D.Ill.: Officer watching video of street radioing officer on the street about seeing a gun was RS
A Chicago PD officer was watching the streets with surveillance cameras, and he observed defendant apparently with a firearm under his shirt. That report to others who conducted the frisk was collective knowledge for a stop [although that phrase isn’t … Continue reading
CA6: One controlled buy from a house is PC for SW
One controlled buy is probable cause for a search warrant of a house. Regular drug trafficking from there not required. United States v. Roberts, 2021 U.S. App. LEXIS 30737 (6th Cir. Oct. 12, 2021). Mere disagreement with the state court’s … Continue reading
FL1: Drug dog sniff of motel door from common hallway reasonable
Drug dog sniff outside motel room door from common hallway invaded no reasonable expectation of privacy. Jardines inapplicable. Robinson v. State, 2021 Fla. App. LEXIS 13874 (Fla. 1st DCA Oct. 13, 2021). Defendant’s actions of pacing and reaching into his … Continue reading
OH5: Furtive movement alone during traffic stop not RS
Defendant’s furtive movements alone during a traffic stop did not rise to reasonable suspicion to extend the stop. State v. Snow, 2021-Ohio-3644, 2021 Ohio App. LEXIS 3559 (5th Dist. Oct. 8, 2021). The officer was drawn to encounter defendant because … Continue reading
CA6: Safe that could have held object of SW could be broken into
A firearm in defendant’s bedroom is at least probable cause for constructive possession. A search warrant for the premises here permitted police to break into a safe that could have held the object of the search. United States v. Mitchell, … Continue reading