Montana

A Montana judge Wednesday approved the release of portions of a presentence investigation report in a criminal case stemming from a 2009 boat crash involving two federal legislators.

The Montana Supreme Court ruled 4-3 that the city of Billings must release an internal investigation letter issued to a police department employee who allegedly made personal purchases on a department credit card.

The publisher and two editors of a Montana newspaper are relying on the state’s shield law to quash subpoenas for their testimony in a change of venue hearing for a double homicide trial, said Pete Meloy, the newspaper’s attorney.

Lawyers for Justine Winter, the 17-year-old defendant accused of killing a mother and son when she drove her car over the center line of a Montana highway, have filed a motion for a change of venue, claiming that online comments and responses to the Daily Inter Lake’s coverage of the case have tainted the jury pool, he said.

Lawyers for a Montana State University professor are trying to force the Bozeman Daily Chronicle to hand over notes related to its reporting on her discrimination lawsuit against the school, and the identities of commenters who wrote on its Web site, the paper reports.

Ian Marquand, a veteran Montana journalist and a national figure in open-government advocacy, has lost his television job amid budget woes, the Missoulian reports.

A Montana radio host on Wednesday was slapped with a $3.8 million slander verdict.

John Stokes, the owner and host of the KGEZ AM radio station in Kalispell, was sued by a father and son who alleged he made defamatory remarks about them on his radio show last year.  

A group of anonymous commenters on a Montana newspaper Web site can stay that way thanks to a Montana District Court judge’s ruling Wednesday.

The Montana Supreme Court last week refused to release the disciplinary records of a former  city prosecutor who was fired for ethical violations but was then hired as a county public defender.