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- CO: Anonymous report of student smoking pot in school justified backpack search
- CA6: CI’s lie to get into def’s house to video him making a drug deal with the CI didn’t violate 4A
- TN: Def lived in a van left wide open in a public area, but it didn’t belong to him, so no REP as to interior
- VI: Despite ubiquity of cell phones, nexus has to be shown to alleged crime
- N.D.Ga.: PIT maneuver here was not excessive force
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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)
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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: Collective knowledge
KS: Petr’s disclaimer of seized cash was a lack of standing in a forfeiture
Claimant’s disclaimer in the money should have been decided first, not the merits of the search. It’s essentially a lack of standing. State ex rel. Kansas Highway Patrol v. $381,620 in U.S. Currency, 2026 Kan. LEXIS 125 (May 15, 2026). … Continue reading
OH5: DTF officer can ask marked car to make stop
A DTF officer surveilling defendant who saw a traffic offense could ask a marked car to make a traffic stop. State v. Streeter, 2026-Ohio-1668 (5th Dist. May 5, 2026).* In the Fulton County 2020 ballot seizure and return case, the … Continue reading
S.D.Ohio: DEA agents tailing a car can request marked unit to make a traffic stop for violations they saw
DEA agents following defendant in an unmarked car observed traffic violations, and they requested a marked unit to make a stop, which was valid. United States v. Peterson, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 90905 (S.D. Ohio Apr. 24, 2026).* A state … Continue reading
Army: PC shown for picture files in other apps on cell phone
There was probable cause to search the picture files in defendant’s cell phone beyond the app defendant used. It was reasonable to conclude pictures could be moved between places on the phone. United States v. Ingram, 2026 CCA LEXIS 119 … Continue reading
N.D.Iowa: RS and PC for stop and then search, so justification for drug dog is irrelevant
Based on two bases of collective knowledge, the officer had justification for a stop and a search, so the justification for the drug dog isn’t even relevant. United States v. Carter, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 45275 (N.D. Iowa Mar. 5, … Continue reading
AR: Trial counsel’s comment motion to suppress ruling was correct didn’t bind appellate counsel
A motion to suppress once made and denied doesn’t have to be renewed during the proof. Trial counsel’s statement that the ruling was correct didn’t bind appellate counsel to raise it, but it loses on the merits anyway. Cobb v. … Continue reading
OH2: Failure to call first officer in collective knowledge not error where second officer’s own observations sufficient
The state failed to call the first officer reporting defendant to the second under the collective knowledge doctrine, but that didn’t result in a reversible denial of confrontation. The second officer’s own observations supported it. State v. Simon, 2025-Ohio-5660 (2d … Continue reading
VA: Exclusionary rule doesn’t apply in revos
The exclusionary rule, along with a host of other things, doesn’t apply in revocation proceedings. Commonwealth v. Jackson, 2025 Va. LEXIS 57 (Nov. 20, 2025) (citing treatise § 9.16). The collective knowledge doctrine applies to traffic stops. United States v. … Continue reading
S.D.Ga.: Just being naked in bed in a hotel room doesn’t give standing
Just being naked in bed in a hotel room doesn’t give standing. Defendant had to show he either was the renter or there by permission of the renter. Here, nothing was offered on standing other than being there. United States … Continue reading
CA5: Officer’s resting hand on truck while talking to def wasn’t a seizure
The officer resting his hand on defendant’s truck while talking to him during a stop was not a separate seizure of him. United States v. Larremore, 2025 U.S. App. LEXIS 20757 (5th Cir. Aug. 14, 2025). The closest case plaintiff … Continue reading
VA: Collective knowledge between state and federal officers for arrest
There was probable cause by collective knowledge for defendant’s arrest at Dulles airport where Virginia police asked Homeland Security to make the arrest. Lewis v. Commonwealth, 2025 Va. App. LEXIS 412 (July 22, 2025) (unpublished).* Appellant’s Fourth Amendment claim was … Continue reading
D.Wyo.: SW’s catch-all phrase was still limited to drugs
“The warrant in this case has a catch-all phrase as to the types of evidence to be searched but is affirmatively limited to evidence of drug trafficking, manufacture, delivery, and possession. The warrant therefore satisfies the requirement described in cases … Continue reading
S.D.N.Y.: Collective knowledge doctrine in CA2 only applies to warrantless searches, not a Franks challenge
Defendant’s Franks claim fails. The omitted allegedly exculpatory evidence either wasn’t material to the probable cause finding or wasn’t known by law enforcement at the time the warrant issued. In this circuit, the collective knowledge doctrine applies to warrantless searches, … Continue reading
D.Alaska: Motions in limine aren’t motions to suppress
Defendant filed a motion in limine in lieu of a motion to suppress which was otherwise out of time. A motion in limine isn’t a substitute for a motion to suppress. Nevertheless, the court goes to the merits of the … Continue reading
CA3: Apartment visitor to conduct drug deal has no standing
An apartment visitor to conduct a drug deal has no standing to contest a search that happened while he was there. United States v. Loyal, 2025 U.S. App. LEXIS 5853 (3d Cir. Mar. 13, 2025). By collective knowledge, there was … Continue reading
N.D.Ga.: USMJ’s credibility determinations on search issue aren’t subject to de novo review
The USMJ’s credibility determinations on a search issue aren’t subject to de novo review before the USDJ. United States v. Messer, 2025 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 11783 (N.D. Ga. Jan. 23, 2025).* Collective knowledge supported reasonable suspicion here to extend the … Continue reading
D.Alaska: Unsigned SW affidavit still in GF where officer was sworn
The affidavit for warrant was unsigned by the officer but he had been sworn before the warrant issued. The good faith exception saves this search. United States v. Hampton, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 200326 (D. Alaska Nov. 4, 2024) Defendant’s … Continue reading
CA3: Collective knowledge applies to reasons to extend a stop
With collective knowledge there was reason to extend the stop. United States v. McAliley, 2024 U.S. App. LEXIS 25982 (3d Cir. Oct. 15, 2024).* (After all, collective knowledge applies to reasonable suspicion too.) The USMJ’s decision denying the motion to … Continue reading
CA2: Failure to leave SW attachment at scene of search doesn’t void the search
That searching officers didn’t leave behind Attachment B to the warrant after the search didn’t void the search. United States v. Whaley, 2024 U.S. App. LEXIS 16819 (2d Cir. July 10, 2024). Collective knowledge here fails: “Based on the evidence … Continue reading
CA6: No QI for shooting a man obviously surrendering
Officers responded to an armed potentially suicidal man they found in his house. When commanded to show his hands he started to get down to the floor when he was shot. “A jury could find these actions would indicate to … Continue reading