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- N.D.Ala.: SW not invalid because issuing judge previously represented the target
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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)
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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: Plain view, feel, smell
AL: Federal adoption of a forfeiture deprives the state court of jurisdiction to order return of property
Federal adoption of a forfeiture deprives the state court of jurisdiction to order return of property. Gray v. City of Opelika, 2015 Ala. Civ. App. LEXIS 254 (Nov. 6, 2015). A traffic offense justified this stop, then “the smell of … Continue reading
OH2: Heroin gel caps found by plain feel
Defendant was fully cooperative and the officer was not overbearing, so the consent was voluntary. Heroin in gel caps was found by plain feel. State v. Mabry, 2015-Ohio-4513, 2015 Ohio App. LEXIS 4400 (2d Dist. Oct. 30, 2015). http://www.supremecourt.ohio.gov/rod/docs/pdf/2/2015/2015-Ohio-4513.pdf Officers … Continue reading
M.D.Fla.: Email SWs are almost never stale; the email is always there
Staleness as to an email search warrant is hard to prove. It’s always going to be on the email provider’s server. United States v. Khateeb, 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 143007 (M.D.Fla. Aug. 4, 2015). Defense counsel was not ineffective for … Continue reading
CA3: A corporate shareholder and executive doesn’t have standing in the corporation’s computer server; no personal connection
“To show he can challenge the search of SPI’s and CDS’s offices and the seizure of the employees’ computers and network server as a shareholder and executive, Nagle must show a personal connection to the place searched or to the … Continue reading
D.N.J.: Plain view supported seizure of records outside scope of search warrant
In a Medicaid fraud document search warrant, some documents found were outside of the scope of the warrant, but they satisfied the plain view doctrine that their potential incriminating nature was immediately apparent and they were found in the course … Continue reading
IL: Refusal of consent to a parole search is a violation of parole conditions in itself
Under Illinois law, refusal of consent to a parole search is a violation of parole conditions in itself. That did not make the consent invalid. The court was entitled to believe he consented knowing that he had 800 g of … Continue reading
MA: A license plate reader is not treated as an anonymous informant with little or no credibility
A license plate reader is not treated as an anonymous informant with little or no credibility. It is based on a database that is sufficiently reliable to based a stop on. Commonwealth v. Ramos, 2015 Mass. App. LEXIS 116 (August … Continue reading
AK: Drug paraphernalia and meth were found by plain feel
On defendant’s stop, the officer saw a cut off straw in defendant’s shirt pocket, and a frisk was justified because of hands in the pockets. The frisk of his thin material shorts revealed a lighter and more straws and it … Continue reading
S.D.Ohio: Going onto the front porch to try a key in the lock didn’t violate Jardines; entering the already cracked open door did
Defendant had no reasonable expectation of privacy in the house searched. It was owned by others and where the electric bill was in another’s name. There was probable cause for a search of a second location. Police going on to … Continue reading
OH: Township officers have no statutory authority to patrol interstates for drugs; violation of statute here violated state constitution
A township officer has no statutory authority to work drug interdiction on an interstate highway. Because statute didn’t authorize the stop, the appellate court properly suppressed under the state constitution. State v. Brown, 2015-Ohio-2438, 2015 Ohio LEXIS 1558 (June 23, … Continue reading
MA: No reasonable expectation of privacy in sneakers defendant allowed to keep in jail
Defendant was allowed to keep his sneakers when he was checked into the jail, but there was no right to keep them. The police showed up with a search warrant for his clothing in jail property. That included the sneakers. … Continue reading
PA: Computer file that had to be opened was not in “plain view”
Riley on cell phone searches applies to computer searches. Defendant had a reasonable expectation of privacy in his files. He took his computer to Circuit City to have a DVD burner put on his computer, and the store technician decided … Continue reading
TX14: Inventory of def’s vehicle proper even though his mother was called to pick it up
Despite the fact the officer called defendant’s mother about picking up his vehicle after his DUI arrest and gave her 15 minutes to get there, the officer could inventory the vehicle while waiting in case she didn’t show rather than … Continue reading
NM declines to find plain view supported seizure of two pills in a baggie that fell out of the glove compartment while driver looking for papers
Seeing two pills in a small plastic baggie fall out of the glove compartment during a stop for expired tags when defendant was looking for his paperwork on the car was not subject to plain view. After all, pharmacy containers … Continue reading
MA: SW for CP on video camera, cell phone, and computer permitted plain view seizure of separate memory cards later searched with a warrant
The police executing a search warrant for nude images of defendant’s 13-year-old stepdaughter on a video camera, cell phone, and computer properly seized three memory cards from digital cameras under the plain view doctrine because his stepdaughter stated he used … Continue reading
CA5: Interstate stalking warrant made laptop and cell phones in motel room seizable by plain view because evidentiary value was “immediately apparent”
Defendant was convicted of interstate stalking a local TV personality and her husband by email and phone. Police had an arrest warrant for him, found his car at a motel, and had the manager call him to the front desk … Continue reading
E.D.Pa.: Gov’t failed its burden to show plain view
The stop was justified by a taillight violation, but the government failed in its burden of proof to show that the gun seized was actually in plain view. “It remains unclear if Officer Washington opened the door or not; however, … Continue reading
CA9: No prohibition to placing GPS on car at night
A tracking order was issued with probable cause, and there’s no special requirement that a GPS device can’t be placed at night, compared to the nighttime search requirements. United States v. Brock, 2015 U.S. App. LEXIS 7195 (9th Cir. April … Continue reading