Archives
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Recent Posts
- E.D.Tenn.: Application for SW was considered in detention ruling
- TN: RS didn’t develop to continue stop; second stop based on first suppressed
- CA4: Traffic stop immediately became firearms investigation; suppressed
- CA10: Disagreement over spelling of street name didn’t make warrant fail particularity; GFE at least would apply
- VA: Statutory requirement to provide SW papers only applies to “places of abode”
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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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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)
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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) -
“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: Cell phones
D.Idaho: Not unreasonable for PO to hand over def’s cell phone to LEO for extraction after RS developed from Snapchat app
Defendant missed a PO visit, and they went to his house. There, they got his cell phone and looked at his Snapchat app finding messages between him and a 14 year old. It was not unreasonable for them to hand … Continue reading
CAAF: Victim’s 4A rights were at issue, too
The military court had to also consider the Fourth Amendment rights of the victim to sensitive information the accused sought access to for trial. All things considered, even if the court martial judge was wrong denying it, it was harmless … Continue reading
OH3: Cell phone search can extend to cloud storage it’s connected to
Defendant gave consent to search his cell phone, and the court notes, without deciding, that other courts have held that such consent would reach his data stored on the cloud or another server. That issue doesn’t, however, have to be … Continue reading
CA4: PIT maneuver with unmarked car for detectives making a stop could be excessive force
Using an unmarked police car to stop plaintiff with a PIT maneuver requested by detectives without warning here raised sufficient factual disputes that the officers do not get summary judgment nor qualified immunity on an excessive force claim in his … Continue reading
CA4: Ptf student’s cell phone properly searched at school under T.L.O.
Plaintiff student’s cell phone was properly searched at school under T.L.O. when he was heard bragging about having explicit photographs on it at school. O.W. v. Carr, 2026 U.S. App. LEXIS 10241 (4th Cir. Apr. 9, 2026). Plaintiff made a … Continue reading
D.Me.: Entering passcode into cell phone to see if it works is not a search
Defendant’s cell phone was seized and a warrant obtained to search it, but it was protected by a passcode and the phone was not searched. So, a couple of months later, they tried again with a new warrant. The information … Continue reading
D.Mass.: A failed attempt at an admin warrant and Franks violation
A contractor doing remodeling to a Bearded Dragon online business told the City about health code violations on the premises after he walked off the job. A health department officer walked through with permission and noted no violations. Later, an … Continue reading
E.D.Pa.: Cell phone search suppressed for lack of nexus to alleged crime; everybody has a cell phone
Cell phone search suppressed for lack of nexus. Merely having one isn’t enough. Everybody has one. United States v. Lacosta-Franco, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 72244 (E.D. Pa. Apr. 2, 2026):
CA8: Cell phone in hands of drug dealer is nexus
Probable cause for a drug dealer’s cell phone is shown because it’s now commonly a “tool of the trade.” United States v. Jones, 2026 U.S. App. LEXIS 9643 (8th Cir. April 3, 2026):
CA9: First cell phone warrant was issued day after seizure; second a year later wasn’t unreasonable
The day after defendant’s cell phone was seized, the government obtained a search warrant for it, and the warrant had a 90-day execution provision. Defendant concedes probable cause. The fact it took a year before a second warrant for the … Continue reading
CA9: 48-hour delay in getting a warrant for a mailed package wasn’t unreasonable
A 48 hour delay in getting a warrant for a mailed package wasn’t unreasonable. United States v. Garza, 2026 U.S. App. LEXIS 8714 (9th Cir. Mar. 25, 2026). Petitioner’s bank records were obtained by search warrant. They are third party … Continue reading
E.D.Mo.: Ubiquity of cell phones here satisfied nexus without stating it
This is about a search warrant issued in an arson investigation and defendant’s claim of lack of nexus. The ubiquity of cell phones means that the officers did not even have to state that they knew defendant had one. United … Continue reading
DE: Lack of binding authority for 5A cell phone thumbprint claim means it’s denied
Trial counsel didn’t challenge the use of defendant’s thumbprint to access his cell phone, acknowledging case law against it being testimonial. “It does not appear that either this Court or the United States Supreme Court has addressed the issue. Nor … Continue reading
MD: Waiting 20 days to get cell phone SW after seizure was reasonable here
Police seized defendant’s cell phone and sought to have it examined. It went into the queue at the forensic unit, and, when it was ready to be searched, they then sought a warrant. They waited because they believed there was … Continue reading
TN: Drug history essentially shows nexus to cell phone
Defendant’s drug history was essentially enough to show nexus to a cell phone. State v. White, 2026 Tenn. Crim. App. LEXIS 131 (Mar. 13, 2026). A civil standby with a police officer for an apartment inspection didn’t violate the Fourth … Continue reading
Army: PC shown for picture files in other apps on cell phone
There was probable cause to search the picture files in defendant’s cell phone beyond the app defendant used. It was reasonable to conclude pictures could be moved between places on the phone. United States v. Ingram, 2026 CCA LEXIS 119 … Continue reading
NY3: Housing law that requires landlords to submit to premises and records searches is unconstitutional
Section 8 housing law that requires landlords to submit to premises and records searches is unconstitutional. Matter of People of the State of N.Y. v. Commons W., LLC, 2026 NY Slip Op 01253 (3d Dept. Mar. 5, 2026). Leave to … Continue reading