Most judges will not approve a search warrant for an entire city block, with a justification of: "Officer Harry had a 'hunch' that a criminal may live somewhere there, or that criminal activity of some kind may be taking place in this area."
As long as warrants are targeted, they tend to be rubber-stamped. The purpose of the warrant process is to make sure that law enforcement is targeted.
Is this based off of personal experience? I do have some experience with dealing with judges, and that has not been my observation, at least not as a hard and fast rule.
> The purpose of the warrant process is to make sure that law enforcement is targeted.
Partially, but the other side of it is that it's to make sure that the search activity is, well, warranted.
Courts already rubber-stamp warrants. There is no court on Earth where the average request for a search warrant will be declined.
The purpose of asking a court for a warrant that it will 100% approve is to permit targeted investigations, while preventing fishing expeditions. If the police wants to investigate someone, or something, courts will rubber-stamp their request. This is by design.