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Recent Posts
- PA: Shining flashlight into hole in a shoebox was a search; there was a REP in the closed box
- CA5: Accidentally shooting the man who disarmed the shooter from a residence was not a constitutional violation
- CA9: False evidence to arrest violates due process
- CA6: The SW affidavit here was thin, but it wasn’t completely bare bones, so GFE applies
- D.Minn.: Extending stop to run ALPR information on car was with RS
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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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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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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: Reasonableness
N.M.I.: Can you overcome officer’s credibility questions by calling it a “reasonable mistake of fact”?
Even if the trial court were to credit the defendant’s version that his sudden lane change was to dodge a puddle or a dog, the officer didn’t see a puddle or dog, just the lane change and that made the … Continue reading
FL2: Def has standing in a package shipped to him under an assumed name
Defendant stated enough to get a hearing on his post-conviction claim that his defense counsel didn’t properly pursue a motion to suppress a package shipped to him under an assumed name, giving him standing in the package, on the ground … Continue reading
CA5: The length of computer search didn’t make it unreasonable where def was a lawyer and taint team had to do first review
Defendant was a lawyer who took his computer in to have the data on the hard drive switched to a new computer. The service guy doing the job noticed file names suggestive of child pornography and he saw at least … Continue reading
FL1: Officer was reasonable in reentering car to retrieve money he took off def and put in car seat; plain view sustained
When defendant was frisked, $1,188 was removed from him, and the officer put it on the trunk then thought to put it through the window so it wouldn’t blow away. The officer then acted reasonably going back into the unlocked … Continue reading
E.D.Mich.: Mixed motive for otherwise valid inventory doesn’t make it unreasonable
A mixed motive for an inventory search doesn’t make it unreasonable as long as the inventory was reasonable. United States v. Dowl, 2017 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 7184 (E.D. Mich. Jan. 19, 2017):
IN: Tossing flash bang into room with only a 9 month old baby in a playpen during drug raid was excessive under the circumstances; suppressed
Using a flash bang device during a SWAT drug raid that went off in a room with only a nine-month old baby in a playpen violated the state constitution for its overall unreasonableness. Watkins v. State, 2017 Ind. App. LEXIS … Continue reading
NC: After Grady, sex offender GPS monitoring requires a reasonableness hearing on def’s request
Post-Grady, the reasonableness requirement of the Fourth Amendment required the trial court conduct a hearing if the defendant objects to GPS monitoring. State v. Stroessenreuther, 2016 N.C. App. LEXIS 1240 (Dec. 6, 2016):
OH5: Ten day delay in getting warrant for cell phone seized on exigency was reasonable
The seizure of defendant’s cell phone at a police interview was reasonable. The detective had probable cause to believe that it contained evidence of an armed robbery. Its warrantless seizure was demanded by the exigencies of the situation because defendant … Continue reading
CT: Even if search was unreasonable, which isn’t decided, it was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt
Defendant was convicted of murdering his girlfriend with a baseball bat. After killing her, he took some of her stuff and sold and gave it away. He spent the third night after the killing at his sister’s house, and he … Continue reading
IL: Stop for failure to signal lane movement was not unreasonable where no case said officer couldn’t make stop
The officer’s stop of defendant for not using his turn signal when the signal lane became two lanes was at least a mistake of law under Heien, already recognized in Illinois. No state case addresses these facts, and it’s not … Continue reading
WA: Objective reasonable facts justified frisk of def when his companion was arrested
“This case requires us to decide under what circumstances officers making a lawful arrest may seize a companion of the arrestee in the absence of reasonable suspicion to independently justify a Terry stop of the companion. We hold that where … Continue reading
S.D.Ala.: That Alabama ABC officers didn’t state authority to make a traffic stop isn’t a 4A issue
Defendant was pulled over by state ABC officers. His claim that they lacked authority to do so under Alabama law doesn’t apply in federal court. That’s his only ground, so motion to suppress denied. United States v. Henry, 2016 U.S. … Continue reading
NC: SW for medical records was reasonable and not barred by HIPAA
Defendant’s motion to suppress wasn’t timely, and the trial court didn’t err for denying it on that ground alone. Even so, on the merits, obtaining defendant’s medical records for DUI by search warrant wasn’t unreasonable: HIPAA permits search and seizure … Continue reading
CA11: Breath test to enter HS prom was reasonable as school search, but unnecessary detention of those who passed was not
Plaintiffs rode a party bus to their high school prom. The prom had a strict no alcohol, drug, or tobacco policy. A champagne bottle was found on the bus, and that led the school district to detain everybody on the … Continue reading
NJ: Heien reasonable mistake doesn’t apply to an unambiguous statute
Defendant was parked with high beams on on a one way street. The statute unambiguously says that it was not a violation unless there was an oncoming vehicle, and being on a one way street or an officer on foot … Continue reading
CA6: Qualified immunity given for use of victim in aiding document search
In a § 1983 case over an insurance billing search warrant executed with the aid of BCBS to help identify records, the court finds the officers are entitled to qualified immunity. There was no showing that the non-law enforcement assistance … Continue reading
E.D.La.: Shipping a package under an alias means no REP in it to challenge search
Defendant shipped a package from a UPS store in San Bernardino CA to Houma LA. His name wasn’t on the package as the sender or the recipient, so he didn’t have standing to challenge the search of the package. United … Continue reading
CNS News: Liberal AG’s Climate Change Probes Abuse Fourth Amendment to Upend First Amendment
CNS News: Liberal AG’s Climate Change Probes Abuse Fourth Amendment to Upend First Amendment by Mark Fitzgibbons. A subpoena for 40 years of records from Exxon about the environment is somehow equated with the Second Amendment (¶ 3, 1st sent.). … Continue reading
VT: Officers would walk up lighted walkway to front door
It was reasonable for the officer to conclude that a lighted walkway to an entrance was the normal entrance to the home. Therefore, the officer didn’t violate the curtilage. The Fourth Amendment and state constitution are not absolute bars to … Continue reading