“Despite a dearth of binding precedent, this Court is satisfied that the existence of an active arrest warrant provides a sufficient basis for a magistrate judge to find probable cause to issue a tracking warrant allowing law enforcement to monitor a fugitive’s location, and Mr. Reed has cited no authority to the contrary in this Circuit or any other. See United States v. Ellerman, No. 22-cr-116, 2023 WL 111982, at *3 (D. Minn. Jan. 5, 2023) (‘Mr. Ellerman cites no authority for the idea that using a judicially approved tracking warrant to locate the subject of a lawful arrest warrant violates the Fourth Amendment, and the Court has found no cases that support such an argument.’).” United States v. Reed, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 175085 (D. Minn. Sep. 26, 2024).
Plaintiff identified himself by name and where he lived, so there was no justification for arresting him for failing to identify himself by not providing a physical ID. Jennings v. Smith, 2024 U.S. App. LEXIS 24513 (11th Cir. Sep. 27, 2024).*
State law permitted vehicle impoundments for defendant’s offense. The officer also sought alternatives permitted by state case law. The impoundment wasn’t unreasonable. United States v. Zamora, 2024 U.S. App. LEXIS 24516 (9th Cir. Sep. 26, 2024).*
A pipe on the car console of a MMJ card holder was not “immediately apparent” it was incriminating for plain view. United States v. Vasquez, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 174528 (N.D. Okla. Sep. 25, 2024).
Plaintiff filed his Fourth Amendment § 1983 two weeks before the statute of limitations ran. Naming a John Doe defendant a month later wasn’t timely. Brown v. Foy, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 173231 (E.D. Wis. Sep. 25, 2024).*
Plaintiff’s strip search in jail was reasonable and for jail security. Bryson v. Retzlaff, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 173235 (E.D. Wis. Sep. 25, 2024).*
Subpoenas that led to search warrants that led to further grand jury proceedings were not improper. The grand jury was free to continue investigating. United States v. Bressi, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 174123 (M.D. Pa. Sep. 26, 2024).*
Defendant’s DNA was taken by warrant at the jail, and his admissions about the offense during that captured on bodycam were admitted at trial. There was no questioning; it was voluntary. Torres v. State, 2024 Ark. App. 457 (Sep. 25, 2024).*
Defendant’s “spontaneous utterance” during execution of a search warrant was admissible at trial. Commonwealth v. Anderson, 2024 Pa. LEXIS 1434 (Sep. 26, 2024).*
Defendant fails to make a substantial preliminary showing for Franks. United States v. Ard, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 171735 (W.D. La. Sep. 13, 2024).*
1983 retaliation case over social media warrants defeated by probable cause and statute of limitations. Stanley v. Bocock, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 171291 (W.D. Va. Sep. 23, 2024).*
The officer does not get qualified immunity in this case because the facts don’t conclusively establish that his shooting an unarmed man he mistakenly thought was armed was reasonable. Sanders v. Newton, 2024 U.S. App. LEXIS 24330 (8th Cir. Sep. 25, 2024).*
The affidavit for the warrant here is more than “bare bones” so the good faith exception applies. “Even if the good-faith exception did not apply, the warrant is still valid because it is supported by probable cause.” United States v. Hernandez, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 173254 (N.D. Tex. Sep. 25, 2024).* This is backwards because probable cause should not be subordinate to the good faith exception. But it’s Kacsmaryk.
Defendant abandoned the firearm before the stop. United States v. Manigault, 2024 U.S. App. LEXIS 24435 (3d Cir. Sep. 26, 2024).*
As a passenger in a car, defendant had no standing in it. United States v. De Jesus, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 174051 (D.P.R. Sep. 24, 2024).*
Nothing from the cell phone search was used at the trial, so there’s nothing to appeal over the denial of the motion to suppress. Brown v. State, 2024 Ark. App. 461 (Sep. 25, 2024).*
(1) Florida’s 4th DCA finds a reasonable expectation of privacy in Facebook private messages as analogous to cell phone text messages. (2) When the records were seized under a warrant for a theft, they couldn’t be searched for evidence of this crime, a shooting. Therefore, the good faith exception is not applied. Young v. State, 2024 Fla. App. LEXIS 7466 (Fla. 4th DCA Sep. 25, 2024):
There is no constitutional requirement for an officer to get an arrest warrant to arrest based on a misdemeanor committed in his presence. The common law says the officer can. United States v. Alvarez, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 172609 (M.D. Pa. Sep. 24, 2024).
This welfare check turned into reasonable suspicion defendant was under the influence. State v. Cleveland, 2024 MT 214 (Sep. 24, 2024).*
The CI’s recorded controlled buys with the defendant in a hotel room recounted in the affidavit for warrant showed probable cause. United States v. Williams, 2024 U.S. App. LEXIS 24285 (6th Cir. Sep. 24, 2024).*
The affidavit for warrant doesn’t show probable cause, but it was all done in good faith and the exclusionary rule will not be applied. United States v. Barbour, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 172873 (E.D. Tenn. Sep. 25, 2024).*
Neither the state nor federal exclusionary rule does not apply in criminal dangerous person civil commitments. State v. T.L.B. (In re T.L.B.), 335 Or. App. 225 (Sep. 25, 2024).
The officer here saw defendant walking at night in a neighborhood where no one walks at night. He turned the car around and came up to defendant to talk to him. Defendant instead fled and abandoned his backpack. The initial encounter wasn’t a stop. United States v. Emory, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 172325 (C.D. Ill. Sep. 24, 2024).*
Defendant is found to have consented to the search of his cell phone. He had some experience in the criminal justice system, and he talked with the police about procedures. United States v. Egli, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 172232 (N.D. Iowa Sep. 24, 2024).*
Plaintiff pled enough to show officers lacked reasonable suspicion for his stop. Degenhardt v. Bintliff, 2024 U.S. App. LEXIS 24251 (5th Cir. Sep. 24, 2024).*
A stop outside the officer’s jurisdiction in violation of statute should not lead to suppression of evidence. The rule of law counsels against suppression. The jurisdictional statutes are for accountabiliy. Commonwealth v. Eakin, 2024 PA Super 222, 2024 Pa. Super. LEXIS 420 (Sep. 25, 2024):
Suppression may be deemed an appropriate remedy “depending upon all of the circumstances of the case including the intrusiveness of the police conduct, the extent of deviation from the letter and spirit of the Act, and the prejudice to the accused.” Commonwealth v. O’Shea, 523 Pa. 384, 567 A.2d 1023, 1030 (Pa. 1989) (citations omitted). Our Supreme Court approved of this “case-by-case approach[,]” first set forth in a Superior Court case, “to the determination of the appropriateness of exclusion of evidence allegedly obtained in violation of the [MPJA].” Id. Such an approach permits “this Commonwealth’s courts to tailor a remedy in situations where police intentionally have overstepped their boundaries while still affording our courts the flexibility to deny suppression when police have acted to uphold the rule of law in good faith but are in technical violation of the MPJA.” Commonwealth v. Hobel, 2022 PA Super 86, 275 A.3d 1049, 1058 (Pa.Super. 2022) (cleaned up).
Posted inExclusionary rule|Comments Off on PA: The Rule of Law here counsels against suppression for a jurisdictional violation
It was settled in this state long ago that there is no reasonable expectation of privacy in third-party cell phone records. Therefore, defense counsel wasn’t ineffective for not challenging it. State v. Rush, 317 Neb. 622 (Sep. 20, 2024).*
On the face of the complaint, plaintiff stated enough for an excessive force claim, but not for dealing with his medical injuries. Poemoceah v. Morton County, 2024 U.S. App. LEXIS 24331 (8th Cir. Sep. 25, 2024).*
The stop was not unreasonably prolonged. United States v. Jinnah, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 171077 (N.D. Iowa Sep. 23, 2024).*
“Louisiana State Police (‘LSP’) senior trooper August McKay committed suicide in his own home after learning that the LSP was reassigning him and preparing to execute a search warrant on his house.” There was no duty to him. McKay v. LaCroix, 2024 U.S. App. LEXIS 24163 (5th Cir. Sep. 23, 2024).*
The lack of an electronics search protocol in the warrant, even if it was constitutionally required, doesn’t even have to be decided because of the good faith exception. “Okafor suggests that the Constitution might nonetheless demand that a warrant specify a search protocol when it authorizes a search of electronic media. The Court need not decide this question because, regardless, the warrants were executed in objective good faith. Under the good-faith exception to the exclusionary rule, ‘evidence seized in reasonable, good-faith reliance on a search warrant’ need not be excluded, even if the warrant is found lacking. … And ‘the fact that a neutral magistrate has issued a warrant is the clearest indication’ that the officers acted in good faith. …” United States v. Okafor, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 170895 (D.D.C. Sep. 23, 2024).
Warrantless entry to obviate the opportunity to destroy evidence isn’t a reason to suppress. Segura v. United States, 468 U.S. 796, 813-16 (1984). “In Segura, the Supreme Court considered this idea in the context of a case where residents of a home could have had an opportunity to destroy evidence, but for the warrantless entry of police officers. Id. The Supreme Court noted that the ‘suggestion that [the defendant] and her cohorts would have removed or destroyed the evidence was pure speculation.” Id. at 816. … In closing, the Court rejected the concept of ‘some “constitutional right” to destroy evidence,’ saying ‘[t]his concept defies both logic and common sense.’ Id. The Seventh Circuit has fully adopted this reasoning. See United States v. Jones, 214 F.3d 836, 838 (7th Cir. 2000) (‘An argument that the suspects would have destroyed the drugs, if only they had more time and full possession of their faculties, is not a good reason to suppress probative evidence of crime.’) (citing Segura, 468 U.S. at 813-16) ….” United States v. Darrah, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 170992 (E.D. Wis. Sep. 23, 2024).*
“Our scrupulous examination of the entire record supports the court’s conclusion that the officers had reasonable cause to believe that the dogs contained within the barn were in imminent harm and neglected, or cruelly treated.” City of Middletown v. Wagner, 2024 Conn. App. LEXIS 245 (Sep. 24, 2024).
Defendant’s application for a writ against his search warrant for a typo discovered 12 years later is too late, and didn’t matter anyway. State v. Workman, 2024 La. App. LEXIS 1503 (La. App. 5 Cir Sep. 23, 2024).*
In objecting to the R&R: “Defendant’s second objection is a general one. Other than stating his disagreement with the conclusion that the two warrantless seizures of defendant’s cell phone were not violations of the Fourth Amendment, defendant does not point to or explain the source of any error or mistake in the R&R’s reasoning.” United States v. Smith, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 170276 (E.D. Tenn. Sep. 20, 2024).*
The magistrate’s determination in the R&R was that plain view applied. Defendant’s objection to the warrant was not at all responsive. United States v. Bankhead, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 170666 (D. Minn. Sep. 23, 2024).*
Even if there was no reasonable suspicion for defendant’s stop, his new offense of eluding the police justified it. United States v. Denton, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 170669 (D. Minn. Sep. 23, 2024).*
The affidavit for this warrant shows probable cause. It doesn’t have to be enough to convict. “Probable cause to issue a search warrant exists if the supporting affidavit provides facts sufficient to ‘lead a prudent person to believe that a search of the described premises would uncover contraband or evidence of a crime.’ … This requires more than a ‘mere suspicion’ but does not require evidence sufficient to convict.” United States v. Radick, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 170236 (E.D. Okla. Aug. 27, 2024), adopted, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 169182 (E.D. Okla. Sep. 19, 2024).*
The vehicle defendant was driving was uninsured. The officer acted reasonably in the stop because defendant was the same gender as the owner, and the car was parked at her house earlier. United States v. Russell, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 169553 (D. Mont. Sep. 19, 2024).*
Defendant claims the search occurred before the warrant was issued, but on the totality of the record, it didn’t. United States v. Shelton, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 170371 (D. Nev. Aug. 15, 2024).*
The reporting requirements of the Corporate Transparency Act of 2021 31 U.S.C. § 5336 do not violate the Fourth or Fifth Amendment under California Bankers Assn. v. Shutlz. Firestone v. Yellen, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 170085 (D. Or. Sep. 20, 2024):
Head Topic: NYPD fails to discipline officers for stop-and-frisk violations, 500-page report says (“The NYPD is essentially letting officers off the hook for using the banned practice of stop-and-frisk, according to a lengthy report that alleges the department is unwilling to police itself. The scathing 500+-page report says the NYPD failed to discipline officers who did not adhere to the court-ordered findings on stop, question and frisk.”)
There is no reasonable expectation of privacy in a hospital ER trauma room, even though there is under state precedent in a single bedroom. People v. Turner, 2024 IL 129208, 2024 Ill. LEXIS 469 (Sept. 19, 2024).
Defendant argued that his probation search was “an extreme search,” but it wasn’t. It was justified by his admission he was on a suspended sentence, and cause isn’t needed under state law. Shealy v. State, 2024 Ark. App. 429 (Sep. 18, 2024).*
Defendant’s admission when in custody that he possessed the methamphetamine he was charged with essentially moots is ineffective assistance claim that counsel should have filed a Franks challenge. United States v. Robinson, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 169684 (E.D. Ky. Sep. 20, 2024).*
The CI’s tale about a shooting was corroborated by his phone records. The fact it was hearsay from one officer to another doesn’t matter. United States v. Gray, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 169701 (E.D. Cal. Sep. 19, 2024).*
With decriminalization of small amounts of marijuana, the smell of marijuana in a car is no longer probable cause to search. People v. Redmond, 2024 IL 129201, 2024 Ill. LEXIS 464 (Sep. 19, 2024). See
techdirt: Court Reminds Cops That Smelling Decriminalized Weed Ain’t The Probable Cause It Used To Be by Tim Cushing (“If there’s anything that’s going to severely reduce the number of pretextual stops performed by cops, it probably won’t be the handful of traffic stop reform efforts being made by legislators. It’s going to be the continued legalization (or decriminalization) of marijuana possession. [¶] One of law enforcement’s favorite tricks is to pull over a car for bullshit reasons, pretend officers smelled marijuana, and engage in a warrantless search in hopes of finding something far more illegal than the pretense that initiated the stop.”)
Defendant claimed the gun in the purse of a passenger in the car who had possession of the purse. This standing and reasonable expectation of privacy here is less than in Rawlings. United States v. Jesus-Ortiz, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 168512 (D.P.R. Sep. 17, 2024).*
Defendant was not seized when officers first drove by him. United States v. Zion, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 168698 (D.N.J. Sep. 18, 2024).*
The CI provided first hand information, and it was corroborated making probable cause. United States v. Radick, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 169182 (E.D. Okla. Sep. 19, 2024).*
Defendant left his car at a convenience store’s gas pumps for 30-40 minutes. The police dog sniff while it was parked was not unreasonable. It was not a stop to be extended. Labbe v. State, 2024 WY 99, 2024 Wyo. LEXIS 101 (Sep. 19, 2024).
“Mr. Tapia was arrested and searched based on a brief interaction with a known drug user in a known drug area. The observing officer admitted that he was not able to hear what Ms. Rivera said to Mr. Tapia and did not see an object or money being exchanged by either of them. Their behavior, viewed in totality, was at best equivocal and susceptible of an innocent interpretation, and therefore could not form the basis for reasonable suspicion to believe that defendant had engaged in a crime.” People v. Tapia, 2024 NY Slip Op 04487 (1st Dept. Sep. 19, 2024).*
Defendant’s wife actively consented to the police search of their property. The claim he refused consent isn’t supported by the record. Lobdell v. Cty. of Spokane, 2024 U.S. App. LEXIS 23813 (9th Cir. Sep. 19, 2024).*
The officers did their due diligence before the search warrant and saw only that defendant’s property was a single-family dwelling. That’s how it appeared, that’s what public records said. Therefore, they searched in good faith. United States v. Rice, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 168016 (D. Neb. Sep. 18, 2024), adopting 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 169301 (D. Neb. July 31, 2024).
This case involved the boarding of a vessel in Dade County, Florida by MDPD and shortly thereafter by the Coast Guard. The opening of a cabin door by MDPD officers revealed transported migrants. The CG would have found them anyway, and that’s inevitable discovery. United States v. Campton, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 168174 (S.D. Fla. Sep. 18, 2024).*
The information in this drug case affidavit wasn’t stale. While some of the information was 15 months old, it was an ongoing operation with the most recent the day before the warrant was sought. United States v. Barnes, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 168433 (E.D. Mich. Sep. 18, 2024).*
Reasonableness of traffic stops are determined by Terry. There was reasonable suspicion for this one. United States v. Batiste, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 168409 (E.D. Tex. Aug. 13, 2024),* adopted, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 167276 (E.D. Tex. Sept. 17, 2024).*
Electronic devices seized in California could be searched in Pennsylvania. United States v. Carter, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 168014 (W.D. Pa. Sep. 18, 2024).
Under established precedent, the smell of marijuana alone coming from defendant’s car permits a search of the trunk. United States v. Morton, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 168000 (E.D. La. Sep. 17, 2024).*
Indiana Tax Court considers a Fourth Amendment challenge to an assessment inspection. “Here, the statute is much more narrowly tailored and requires prior notification of the owner or occupant before inspection, and the discovery order gave Bougie a thirty-day period in which to allow the Assessor or the Assessor’s representative entry to inspect the property. There is also the question of whether Bougie had a reasonable expectation of privacy from a scheduled inspection, especially as that inspection was needed to verify an adjustment in his property assessment that he requested. [¶] The Court does not address that question or the underlying statute’s constitutionality as no inspection ever took place. The Court, thus, rejects Bougie’s Fourth Amendment claim.” Bougie v. Chapman, 2024 Ind. Tax LEXIS 40 (T.C. Sep. 18, 2024).*
"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.
