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- Reason: Homeland Security Is Monitoring Activists Building Anti-Flock Tech
- W.D.Pa.: Def can’t repackage a losing 4A standing claim into a due process claim
- GA: No case says SW required to ask for cell phone password
- VA: Body cam video of valid arrest would not be suppressed
- NM: Trial court’s finding of consent is reversed because the court engaged in its own internet investigation beyond what the parties provided
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Feedspot’s Best Legal Blogs and Websites 2023-2026,
also, firm website Top 90 Criminal Law Blogs 2026 -
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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)
--Federal Laws Relating to Cybersecurity: Discussion of Proposed Revisions (2012)
ACLU on privacy
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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: Excessive force
MA: Use of some additional force in arresting def was not “disproportionate” based on what police knew about firearms in car and risk of violence
The use of some additional force in arresting defendant was not “disproportionate” based on information defendant was armed and that his girlfriend, traveling with him, could use violence to “upset” his arrest. Commonwealth v. Widener, 2017 Mass. App. LEXIS 85 … Continue reading
NE: SW for property includes vehicles found and belonging there
Search warrant for property includes vehicles parked on the property that are connected to the property [as in the owner]. State v. Hidalgo, 296 Neb. 912, 2017 Neb. LEXIS 87 (June 9, 2017). Officers coming upon an assault in progress, … Continue reading
SCOTUS: Co. of LA v. Mendez: No constitutional basis for the Ninth Circuit’s “provocation” rule that an officer’s conduct that provokes a violent response is a separate Fourth Amendment claim
There is no constitutional basis for the Ninth Circuit’s “provocation” rule that an officer’s conduct that provokes a violent response is a separate Fourth Amendment claim. County of Los Angeles v. Mendez, 2017 U.S. LEXIS 3396 (U.S. May 30, 2017). … Continue reading
NYLJ: Federal Jury Awards $8M to Man Injured by Police Stun Gun
NYLJ: Federal Jury Awards $8M to Man Injured by Police Stun Gun by Jason Grant: A federal jury has awarded a mentally disabled Long Island man and his parents $8.32 million after police used a stun gun on the man … Continue reading
CA11: Shooting of ptf during drug raid was reasonable and subject to QI
This § 1983 case arose from a shooting death by police during execution of a drug search warrant. The pre-search briefing told the officers that the suspect inside was involved in drug dealing and was likely armed, so a no-knock … Continue reading
WaPo: ‘I don’t like to be touched’: Video shows 10-year-old autistic boy getting arrested at school
WaPo: ‘I don’t like to be touched’: Video shows 10-year-old autistic boy getting arrested at school by Lindsey Bever. The parents were told to bring the child in this month for “testing” and he was handcuffed and taken away by … Continue reading
WaPo: Watch Blog: Forced catheterizations are a good reminder that the drug war is as barbaric and cruel as ever
WaPo: Watch Blog: Forced catheterizations are a good reminder that the drug war is as barbaric and cruel as ever by Radley Balko:
CA11: Nolo plea establishes PC for arrest; excessive force can be shown by the injuries
Plaintiff’s nolo plea established probable cause for his arrest. Plaintiff’s excessive force claim, however, is established by clearly established law and the district court erred in finding it was de minimus. It appears that plaintiff was handcuffed and compliant but … Continue reading
WSJ: With Trump, Police Hope to Deploy Military Gear Banned Under Obama
WSJ: With Trump, Police Hope to Deploy Military Gear Banned Under Obama by Zusha Elinson and Beth Reinhard: They also sense receptivity to tougher laws on violence against officers; “What a difference six months makes.” Keep the people in place … Continue reading
WaPo: The Watch Blog: On Wednesday, the Supreme Court will hear a case with major implications for the Second and Fourth Amendments
WaPo: The Watch Blog: On Wednesday, the Supreme Court will hear a case with major implications for the Second and Fourth Amendments by Radley Balko:
WaPo: ‘The Watch’ Blog: South Carolina police shot a man to pieces over $100 worth of pot, then lied about it
WaPo: ‘The Watch’ Blog: South Carolina police shot a man to pieces over $100 worth of pot, then lied about it by Radley Balko: Prosecutors drop drug charges against Julian Betton after cops’ account of the raid that paralyzed him … Continue reading
NYTimes: Door-Busting Drug Raids Leave a Trail of Blood
NYTimes: Door-Busting Drug Raids Leave a Trail of Blood by Kevin Sack: Using SWAT officers to storm into homes to execute search warrants has led time and again to avoidable deaths, gruesome injuries and costly legal settlements. (with video)
WaPo: ‘The Watch’ Blog: Jeff Sessions dismisses DOJ reports on police abuse without bothering to read them
WaPo: ‘The Watch’ Blog: Jeff Sessions dismisses DOJ reports on police abuse without bothering to read them by Radley Balko: The AG should say when he thinks federal intervention is necessary, and when it isn’t.
WaPo: ‘The Watch’ Blog: A day with ‘killology’ police trainer Dave Grossman
WaPo: ‘The Watch’ Blog: A day with ‘killology’ police trainer Dave Grossman by Radley Balko: These classes are getting increasingly popular at a time when the dominant political party seems to believe police officers should be given more latitude, get … Continue reading
WaPo: ‘The Watch’ Blog: 11th Circuit: Cops weren’t given enough notice that police tactics used for decades are unconstitutional
WaPo: ‘The Watch’ Blog: 11th Circuit: Cops weren’t given enough notice that police tactics used for decades are unconstitutional by Radley Balko:
CA10: QI applies to suit by driver and his child in car over police shooting driver
Several officers attempted to stop plaintiff at 3:50 am, and he finally stopped. One officer got in front of the car with a shotgun, and the car moved forward. That officer fired two shots from a shotgun at the driver, … Continue reading
NY1: Issue of fact on PC precludes SJ of assault and battery claim
An “issue of fact as to probable cause for [an] arrest precludes summary dismissal of [an] assault and battery claim”. Burgos-Lugo v. City of New York, 2017 NY Slip Op 00534, 2017 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 536 (Jan. 26, 2017).* … Continue reading
WY: Jury instruction on the state version of the 4A wasn’t proper in case involving use of force against officer in his house
One is not entitled to use excessive force against a police officer unlawfully in the home. The officer must also be using excessive force. Defendant’s proffered jury instruction that merely recited the state constitutional provision on search and seizure was … Continue reading
Police One: What cops need to know about TASER use, the Fourth Amendment and excessive use of force
Police One: What cops need to know about TASER use, the Fourth Amendment and excessive use of force by Mike Callahan By analyzing case law, we can glean constitutional guidance concerning when the use of a TASER is lawfully appropriate … Continue reading
Chicago Tribune: Justice report finds systemic failures by Chicago police
Chicago Tribune: Justice report finds systemic failures by Chicago police by Jason Meisner, Annie Sweeney, Dan Hinkel and Jeremy Gorner: The U.S. Department of Justice has released a long-awaited report castigating the Chicago Police Department for abuse against citizens, excessive … Continue reading