Archives
-
Recent Posts
- VA: 12 second question about drugs didn’t unreasonably prolong the stop that was going to take a while anyway
- 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
-
-
ABA Journal Web 100, Best Law Blogs (2015-17) (then discontinued)
-
-
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) -
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Fourth Amendment cases, citations, and links -
Latest Slip Opinions:
U.S. Supreme Court (Home)
S.Ct. Shadow Docket Database
Federal Appellate Courts Opinions
First Circuit
Second Circuit
Third Circuit
Fourth Circuit
Fifth Circuit
Sixth Circuit
Seventh Circuit
Eighth Circuit
Ninth Circuit
Tenth Circuit
Eleventh Circuit
D.C. Circuit
Federal Circuit
Foreign Intell.Surv.Ct.
FDsys, many district courts, other federal courts
Military Courts: C.A.A.F., Army, AF, N-M, CG, SF
State courts (and some USDC opinions)
Google Scholar
Advanced Google Scholar
Google search tips
LexisWeb
LII State Appellate Courts
LexisONE free caselaw
Findlaw Free Opinions
To search Search and Seizure on Lexis.com $ -
Research Links:
Supreme Court:
SCOTUSBlog
S. Ct. Docket
Solicitor General's site
SCOTUSreport
Briefs online (but no amicus briefs)
Oyez Project (NWU)
"On the Docket"–Medill
S.Ct. Monitor: Law.com
S.Ct. Com't'ry: Law.com
-
General (many free):
LexisWeb
Google Scholar | Google
LexisOne Legal Website Directory
Crimelynx
Lexis.com $
Lexis.com (criminal law/ 4th Amd) $
Findlaw.com
Findlaw.com (4th Amd)
Westlaw.com $
F.R.Crim.P. 41
www.fd.org
Federal Law Enforcement Training Center Resources
FBI Domestic Investigations and Operations Guide (2008) (pdf)
DEA Agents Manual (2002) (download)
DOJ Computer Search Manual (2009) (pdf)
Stringrays (ACLU No. Cal.) (pdf)
-
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
Privacy Foundation
Electronic Frontier Foundation
NACDL’s Domestic Drone Information Center
Electronic Privacy Information Center
Criminal Appeal (post-conviction) (9th Cir.)
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) -
“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: Burden of proof
WI: Confrontation clause does not apply to suppression hearings
The confrontation clause is a trial right, so does not apply to suppression hearings. So the use of a deceased police officer’s recorded statement at a suppression hearing did not violate the confrontation clause. State v. Zamzow, 2017 WI 29, … Continue reading
D.N.M. allows motion to reconsider under implied authority and denies it
On defendant’s motion to reconsider the prior denial of the motion to suppress, the new evidence that defendant has doesn’t change the outcome. United States v. Thayer, 2017 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 51255 (D.N.M. April 3, 2017).* The motion to reconsider … Continue reading
OH10: Hearsay of one officer about another not inadmissible in suppression hearing about RS
The trial court did not err in relying in part on hearsay testimony by one officer about another to find that there was reasonable suspicion for defendant’s detention. State v. Box, 2017-Ohio-1138, 2017 Ohio App. LEXIS 1165 (10th Dist. March … Continue reading
W.D.Okla: Def bears burden of proving “private search” was by government actor and did; suppressed
Defendant has sufficient interest in the business from which a thumb drive with data was taken and turned over to ICE officers at the U.S. Embassy in Panama. (The court acknowledges that it’s not “standing,” per se, but it continues … Continue reading
MO: A body between apartments justified an entry to see if there were other victims
Police get a call about women screaming and yelling and a body between two buildings. They show up and circumstances connect them to an apartment. A community caretaking function search for another victim is proper. State v. Shegog, 2017 Mo. … Continue reading
TX14: When trial court finds two theories, defendant has to argue both on appeal or he defaults one
The state raised alternate theories and both were found by the trial court. The defendant didn’t put on a defense to the state’s search incident argument. On appeal, he didn’t argue the search incident issues and defaulted them. Mixon v. … Continue reading
TN: Def’s post-conviction burden is to show that the motion to suppress would have prevailed
On a post-conviction petition that defense counsel was ineffective, the defense has to put on proof to show that there is some reason to believe that the motion to suppress would have been granted if it had been pursued at … Continue reading
MO: Where there are two justifications for a stop, challenging only one does not provide relief
There were two justifications for defendant’s stop. Defendant only challenged one, so it’s moot. State v. Swartz, 2017 Mo. App. LEXIS 74 (Feb. 14, 2017). The sound of defendant’s car apparently hitting another car constituted a hit and run, and … Continue reading
M.D.Pa.: General motion to suppress denied for not pleading any facts or law
“In light of the fact that Defendant fails to specify which statements he is seeking to suppress and the insufficiency of Defendant’s explanation for why the arrest warrant lacks probable cause, I am unable to properly consider these motions. Fourth … Continue reading
TN: General statement of “certified question of law” requires dismissal of appeal
Defendant’s general statement of the search and seizure in his state mandated “certified question of law” was insufficient for lack of what it was and what was sought to be suppressed, and the appeal is dismissed. State v. Forest, 2017 … Continue reading
CA6: Without record references to where the facts are, the court finds the 4A argument waived; counsel blames word limits on briefs
Defendant had waived his challenge to the denial of motions to suppress where he failed to point to any findings in the record demonstrating how the district court erred or why a wiretap application lacked probable cause. Even if defendant … Continue reading
N.D.Ga.: Police reports attached to post-hearing brief not in evidence would not be considered
“[T]he Court does not consider the exhibits that Smith attached to his post-evidentiary hearing brief. These documents presumably were in Defendant’s possession at the time of the evidentiary hearings and could have been used to cross-examine the witnesses. Smith does … Continue reading
NC: Def waived issue of RS for appeal by arguing PC instead; on merits, there was RS anyway
Defendant abandons his argument that there was no reasonable suspicion for his stop by providing no argument on reasonable suspicion and instead focusing on probable cause. Going to the record, however, the court finds reasonable suspicion for the stop because … Continue reading
E.D.Mich.: Sex trafficking a minor in a hotel room was exigency for warrantless entry on PC
Defendant rented his hotel room under a known alias of his for which he had an ID card. That gave him standing. The exigency of sex trafficking a minor justified the officer’s warrantless entry, and it’s apparent there was probable … Continue reading
CA9: 911 call about suicide by overdose justified entry
Police received a 911 call about a suicide by overdose, and the entry into the premises was reasonable. Ames v. King County, 2017 U.S. App. LEXIS 660 (9th Cir. Jan. 13, 2017). Claimant failed to make a Fourth Amendment claim … Continue reading
M.D.Fla.: Franks challenge requires proffer by affidavit, not merely representations by counsel
Franks challenge requires an offer of proof by affidavit. Representations of counsel aren’t enough. United States v. Houston, 2017 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 558 (M.D.Fla. Jan. 4, 2017). After dealing with all the allegations:
D.Md.: Govt first raising standing in a supplement brief after hearing was waiver
The government’s first raising standing in a supplemental brief after the hearing is too late. United States v. Larson, 2016 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 175547 *3 n.2 (D.Md. Dec. 19, 2016):
D.N.M.: When neither party requests a hearing and only disputed fact isn’t material, one won’t be held
Neither party requested a hearing on the motion to suppress and one isn’t required. Here, there is one disputed fact and it isn’t material to the outcome. United States v. Benavidez, 2016 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 175373 (D.N.M. Dec. 19, 2016).
E.D.Pa.: Court just doesn’t buy officer’s story about seeing gun; suppressed
The court just doesn’t believe the officer’s testimony that he saw a gun to justify an engine compartment search under the automobile exception. The government’s fallback position that it was valid as a Terry frisk is also rejected for lack … Continue reading