Newspaper Managers Told to Yield Control

A judge ruled that managers must give up control of the Salt Lake Tribune next week even as they continue a legal fight to buy back the newspaper.

U.S. District Judge Ted Stewart also ruled that MediaNews Group, the paper’s corporate owner, can’t sell any Tribune asset worth more than $250,000 without prior notice to the Tribune’s former owners. It also must delay plans to build a new printing plant.

MediaNews, which owns the Los Angeles Daily News and Denver Post, bought Utah’s largest newspaper in January 2001 but has had no editorial and little financial control because of litigation.