Breeze had taken a flier from demonstrators who were outside the building protesting a Kingston-related hearing. He alleges Salt Lake County Sheriff's officers insisted the flier was banned material and refused to let him leave it in his briefcase while he conducted his busi- ness.

The Salt Lake City attorney has now filed suit challenging an unwritten rule that any nonlegal materials advocating a position on a court case cannot be brought inside the Matheson Courthouse. In his legal action, filed Friday at U.S. District Court, Breeze says the policy is a violation of his First Amendment rights and asks for an order allowing courthouse visitors to possess brochures.

The Sheriff's Office declined to comment on a pending lawsuit.

Breeze says he accepted a flier as he was walking into the courthouse on April 12 from supporters of Heidi Mattingly Foster and polygamist John Daniel Kingston, whose children have been the subject of abuse and neglect allegations. At the time, 3rd District Judge Andrew Valdez was conduct- ing a hearing on whether to reunite the children with Mattingly Foster or initiate a trial to terminate the couple's parental rights.

According to his suit, Breeze glanced at the brochure, then placed it in his briefcase so he could read it later. But when a sheriff's deputy at the door opened the briefcase and spotted the flier, he said the lawyer would have to take the material out to his car before he could enter the building, the suit says.

A memo on the incident by Sheriff's Lt. Wallace Gray says precedent for banning advocacy materials was set in early 2004 when a group protesting the prosecution of Melissa Rowland confronted a district attorney inside the courthouse. Rowland was charged with murder after she rejected medical advice to have a C-section and gave birth to a stillborn baby.

After the incident, a judge gave written instructions that no signs, objects or papers that promoted a position in the Rowland case were allowed in the building.

Gray notes that he made several requests after the Rowland case that a judge issue a written order outlining what material is banned, but that he never received a response.

He also said Breeze was rude and threatening.

"We would have been happy to discuss the situation with him, but he did not allow this," the memo says. "We did not take the material he was complaining about. We simply said he could not bring it into the building, but could take it to his car or anything else he wished to do."

pmanson@sltrib.com