Panel orders hearing in suit over men's exclusion from press conference

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By The Associated Press

Story Published: May 8, 2008 at 9:24 PM MST

Story Updated: May 8, 2008 at 9:24 PM MST

HELENA - A federal appeals court says a trial should go forward on whether three conservationists were improperly excluded from a press conference at the Bitterroot National Forest's headquarters in Hamilton.

The case stems from a September 2005 news conference at which the U.S. Forest Service released an environmental review of a controversial timber sale. Three members of the conservation group Friends of the Bitterroot, Stewart Brandborg, Larry Campbell and Jim Miller, say they were escorted from the event by armed Forest Service law enforcement officers.

The men later filed suit against forest supervisor Dave Bull, saying their constitutional rights had been violated. In a decision issued last week, a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the Forest Service's right to allow only certain people to speak at its press conferences.

But it sent the case back to U.S. District Court in Missoula, for a hearing on whether excluding the men from the event violated their free speech rights.

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