Two Mequon police officers investigating a possible underage drinking party violated the host's constitutional rights against unreasonable searches and could be held liable for damages, a federal judge has ruled.

An anonymous caller told police that a 2015 Halloween party in Gazebo Hills involved minors drinking alcohol. When officers arrived, they saw five cars, and youths inside through the front window, butno one would answer their knocks or calls.

Officers Matthew Schossow and Kristin Sudinski-Toryfterthen took a pathway to a secluded backyard patio area. Peeking through a slit in the closed blinds of awindow, they saw an open vodka bottle and a beer can. They used that information to get a search warrant and around 1:30 a.m., theyentered the home.

By then, 17 officers had responded to the area.

The original eight guests all Homestead High School football players did not have any alcohol on their breath, but four other minorswho had shown up later did. The host, John Reardon, was cited, but his ticketwas later dismissed. Three of the other minors got tickets for underage drinking.

In 2018, he and his father, Todd Michael Reardon, sued the city and several officers in federal court. On Tuesday, U.S. District Judge J.P. Stadtmueller found that the initial officers violated the Fourth Amendment protection against unreasonable searches when they went to the rear yard and looked into a window.

And since the information they obtained by doing so that there was open alcohol inside was a key element in their request for a search warrant, the warrant itself was invalid and the entrance and search pursuant to that warrant unconstitutional.

Lawyers for the officers argued that they did not need a warrant to go in the backyard because they were securing the perimeter, "a legitimate law enforcement objective." But Stadtmueller said the case law does not support such a broad exception to the warrant requirement.

"Nor could it: such a holding would gut the Fourth Amendment of its protections, and result in routine circumvention of the warrant process," he wrote.

Stadtmueller also found, however, that the city could not be held liable for the officers' actions because there was no evidence that Mequon's crackdown on underage drinking parties was "the moving force behind the officers decision to unlawfully search the home and curtilage without securing a valid warrant."

"This claim will proceed to trial on the issue of damages for the direct Fourth Amendment claims against Toryfter and Schossow only, however nominal those damages may be," Stadtmueller's order reads.

ContactBruce Vielmetti at (414) 224-2187or bvielmetti@jrn.com. Followhim on Twitter at @ProofHearsay.

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