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- D.Utah: Minor detours to writing up a traffic ticket didn’t unreasonably extend this stop; the dog was quickly on its way
- KY: Despite lack of nexus, SW sustained under GFE
- CO: DNA could be seized from trash
- CA8: Nebraska statute allowing SWs to cross state lines doesn’t violate 4A
- WA: Sweat patch as condition of release violated state constitution’s privacy provision
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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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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)
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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
IN: Jamming to music or twitching from drugs?
So, was defendant’s jerking movement in his car at 8 am him “jamming” or “grooving” to music or under the influence of a stimulant drug? Not enough here for reasonable suspicion. This is but a hunch. Wilson v. State, 2026 … Continue reading
CA3: Second protective sweep was justified by noise inside
The premises had been subjected to a protective sweep seeing firearms, locked up, and a search warrant was sought. Officers heard a noise inside and came in and found defendant and he’d apparently moved one of the guns. The initial … Continue reading
D.N.M.: Automobile exception search fails for lack of PC
The search of defendant’s car was unreasonable under the automobile exception because there was no probable cause to believe drugs or other evidence would be found there. Also, the inventory was invalid. United States v. Lujan, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS … Continue reading
N.D.Ga.: The Fulton County GA 2020 ballot seizure case is ordered unsealed
The Fulton County 2020 ballot seizure case is ordered unsealed. Pitts v. United States, No. 1:26-MI-00012-JPB, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 28859 (N.D. Ga. Feb. 7, 2026). (Case number provided for Pacer users. I read the affidavit for warrant, and there … Continue reading
CA8: Stop unreasonably extended for drug dog; denial of suppression reversed
Window tint violation should have taken 5-6 minutes, but it dragged out for 20 minutes while the drug dog was coming. The stop was overlong under Rodriguez and the motion to suppress should have been granted. United States v. Johnson, … Continue reading
D.Mont.: LPN stop was long but also supported by outstanding warrant and then consent
Defendant’s stop for an inactive LPN was reasonable. The stop, however, was overlong and quickly turned into a drug investigation. There was also a warrant on the passenger. Defendant consented to it, and she was told she could refuse. United … Continue reading
M.D.La.: Opening the oven door during a probation home visit was reasonable, and guns were found
Defendant was under state supervision. Officers conducted a residence check and opened the oven finding three firearms. That search was reasonable. United States v. Hoang, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 24056 (M.D. La. Feb. 5, 2026). Defendant was found sleeping in … Continue reading
CA11: Jury gets to decide here that stop lacked RS
There’s a dispute for the jury whether there was reasonable suspicion for plaintiff’s continued detention. The stop was based on an anonymous tip, and plaintiff didn’t match it, which the officers had to know. Jarvis v. City of Daytona Beach, … Continue reading
CA6: Flock violated no duty to ptf when he was stopped based on police mistake, if there was one
Plaintiff sued Flock because he was stopped but then released because his LPN was put on a “hot list” by police, apparently mistakenly. He had no reasonable expectation of privacy in his LPN, and his stop was by the police, … Continue reading
CA10: Inconsistency in travel plans isn’t RS per se; officer has to see that they’re lying
Inconsistency in travel plans alone isn’t reasonable suspicion to extend a vehicle stop. The officer has to conclude that one of the occupants was lying about plans. “A trooper can reasonably suspect criminal activity when a driver and passenger lie … Continue reading
E.D.Pa.: Flight after police came after def was not quite Wardlaw’s “headlong flight”
Being in a high crime area means less when defendant is doing nothing wrong. Defendant didn’t run away from officers until they came after him. It’s kind of provoked flight, not Wardlow’s “headlong flight.” On the totality, there was no … Continue reading
CA11: The general 48-hour rule for first appearances doesn’t apply to non-citizens arrested at sea
The general 48-hour rule for first appearances doesn’t apply to non-citizens arrested at sea. United States v. Dominguez, 2026 U.S. App. LEXIS 3529 (11th Cir. Feb. 4, 2026). “Because the 911 caller’s information did not describe conduct that was obviously … Continue reading
ID: There is no legal privilege in pharmacy records
There is no legal privilege in pharmacy records. Pharmacists are independent actors in the medical field. The trial court erred in granting a motion in limine. Just because a psychotherapist prescribed a drug isn’t privileged. State v. Borek, 2026 Ida. … Continue reading
MT: When officers lawfully get ID, they can run it
Running defendant’s name after lawfully asking for ID led to a warrant, and it was all reasonable. State v. Fish, 2026 MT 12 (Feb. 3, 2026)*: At no point during his interaction with Fish did Deputy Kammerzell breach the Fourth … Continue reading
N.D.Ga.: 28-day delay in getting SW for phones wasn’t unreasonable here
Defendant was driving a car with a fraudulent VIN but claimed he knew nothing about that, having borrowed the car. Other things in the car added to probable cause to believe he was involved in frauds, and that ultimately led … Continue reading
ND: When the main way into a house is through the garage, no violation of curtilage to enter
While this house was being worked on, the way in was through the garage and door inside there, not the front door. Therefore, police were able to come through the garage to knock. Therefore, no violation of curtilage making the … Continue reading
ID: Finding drugs in 43% of dog alerts doesn’t mean dog unreliable or no PC
This drug dog only found drugs in 43% of alerts. That’s still enough for probable cause. Dogs can alert where drugs have been. Lack of success doesn’t mean false hits. State v. Barritt, 2026 Ida. LEXIS 16 (Jan. 29, 2026). … Continue reading
OR: Being ordered to walk backwards toward officer with hands up is a seizure
The juvenile being ordered to walk backwards to the officer with hands up is a seizure, and here it was with reasonable suspicion. P.L. v. C.P.L. (In re C.), 346 Or. App. 499 (Jan. 22, 2026) (argued 18 months ago). … Continue reading
D.N.M.: Impoundment of backpack not shown proper under police procedures
The impoundment of defendant’s car and his backpack from an apartment complex parking lot was not shown to be within the standardized procedures of the department. That’s the government’s burden. Motion to suppress granted. United States v. Majedi, 2026 U.S. … Continue reading