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- CA6: Knowing passcode to cell phone shows common authority over it to consent
- VI: Smell of MJ no longer PC in VI since legalization
- Reason: 3 Charlotte Cops Resign After Group Chat Reveals Competition To Arrest the Most Black People
- E.D.Mich.: Second SW for cell phone data retained by govt was valid
- S.D.W.Va.: “Shocking” nature of immigration raid on a Mexican restaurant at lunchtime didn’t warrant suppression
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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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Federal Law Enforcement Training Center Resources
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: Drug or alcohol testing
MA: Obtaining CSLI by SW in 2014 was independent source against 2010 obtaining by request (and Carpenter was 2018)
The state obtained defendant’s CSLI without a showing of probable cause in 2010. In 2014, they sought it again with a search warrant. Carpenter came in 2018. The independent source doctrine applied in the 2014 search, and defense counsel wasn’t … Continue reading
TX14: SW to take blood includes ability to forensically test it
The search warrant for taking defendant’s blood included the ability to forensically test it. The fact that the forensic analysis of defendant’s blood occurred at a date beyond the three-day window for execution of the warrant did not render the … Continue reading
ABA CJS: The Privacy Implications of DUI Refusals and Forced Blood Alcohol Tests: What Judges Can Do
ABA CJS: The Privacy Implications of DUI Refusals and Forced Blood Alcohol Tests: What Judges Can Do by Hon. Zuberi Bakari Williams (“Usually, a refusal to take an alcohol breath test ends the collection of evidence of alcohol for routine … Continue reading
GA: Defendant’s refusal to submit to a urine test wasn’t a 5A violation
Defendant’s refusal to submit to a urine test wasn’t a Fifth Amendment violation. Motion to suppress improperly granted. State v. Awad, 2020 Ga. App. LEXIS 589 (Oct. 20, 2020):
E.D.Cal.: “probable cause does not require the best conceivable evidence”
“In defendant’s case, he was arrested for a violation of § 4.23(a)(1), permitting a BAC test as a search incident to arrest under Birchfield. Although there is a distinction between the concentration of alcohol in the blood and the degree … Continue reading
MN: McNeely retroactive where properly pled
“We also conclude that McNeely applies retroactively to Edwards’s test-refusal conviction. Finally, we conclude that the postconviction court erred when it failed to follow the heightened pleading requirement and burden-shifting procedure set out in Fagin. We therefore reverse the postconviction … Continue reading
TX: SW to draw blood in DUI case allows testing for BAC
A search warrant to draw defendant driver’s blood included the ability to test it for BAC. But not anything else, such as genetic information, but that’s not the issue. Crider v. State, 2020 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 612 (Sept. 16, … Continue reading
Argus Leader: Federal judge awards thousands to those forcibly catheterized for urine samples
Argus Leader: Federal judge awards thousands to those forcibly catheterized for urine samples by Danielle Ferguson (“A federal judge has approved a settlement to individuals who were unconstitutionally made to provide urine samples for suspected drug use through forced catheterizations. … Continue reading
HI: Local police dept’s implied consent form was accurate
On the totality, defendant’s consent to BAC testing was voluntary. The police department’s implied consent form was accurate. State v. Hosaka, 2020 Haw. LEXIS 256 (Aug. 28, 2020)*:
D.P.R.: Def retained REP in backpack he stored in a car he wasn’t riding in
Defendant retained a reasonable expectation of privacy in a backpack that he placed in a car that he wasn’t in when it was searched. “The following circumstances established that the defendant possessed a reasonable expectation of privacy in the briefcase: … Continue reading
CA6: Alleged false statement to get an arrest warrant overcame QI
Alleged false statement to get an arrest warrant overcame qualified immunity. Tlapanco v. Elges, 2020 U.S. App. LEXIS 25595 (6th Cir. Aug. 12, 2020). The state failed to show exigent circumstances excused obtaining a search warrant for defendant’s BAC. Commonwealth … Continue reading
D.Me.: No exigent circumstances for BAC blood sample without SW
A Park Ranger in Acadia National Park in Maine followed Maine law to get a blood sample without a search warrant. There were no exigent circumstances, and the blood sample is suppressed. United States v. Manubolu, 2020 U.S. Dist. LEXIS … Continue reading
TX1: SW to seize blood sample implicitly means it can be tested, too
A search warrant for a blood sample implicitly includes testing it. Davis v. State, 2020 Tex. App. LEXIS 5990 (Tex. App. – Houston (1st Dist.) July 30, 2020). Probable cause existed for seizure of five years of defendant’s Gmail account. … Continue reading
CA9 applies QI standard to “egregious violations” of 4A for ICE entries
ICE entry onto appellant’s curtilage to arrest him was not an egregious violation of the Fourth Amendment, the court applying qualified immunity language to show it wasn’t. “At the time of the entry, no binding authority held that an officer’s … Continue reading
LA: Failure to argue Schmerber in trial court was waiver
Defendant’s failure to argue Schmerber in the trial court was [essentially] waiver, and defendant didn’t show the trial court erred. State v. Michael, 2020 La. LEXIS 1347 (July 9, 2020):
CA9: UA in prison is reasonable
“It is undisputed that urinalysis testing is a search under the Fourth Amendment and that drug testing in the prison context is generally constitutional unless it is conducted in an unreasonable manner. See Thompson v. Souza, 111 F.3d 694, 701 … Continue reading
MT: Field test of seized drugs is a reasonable search
A field test of drugs seized off defendant’s person finding them presumptively methamphetamine is reasonable under the Fourth Amendment and the state constitution. There is no enlarged reasonable expectation of privacy as to them when seized. State v. Funkhouser, 2020 … Continue reading