U.S. District Court Judge John Sedwick in Anchorage issued the order Friday. Sedwick is the same judge who sided with Glen Ith, a federal biologist who sued the Forest Service in 2006 after discovering that the agency was building bridges and repairing logging roads for timber sales that had not been approved.
Ith was placed on administrative leave after he filed the lawsuit and appealed two Tongass timber sales.
Ultimately, his position was eliminated in a downsizing. Four days later, he died of a heart attack.
The Office of Special Counsel, an independent government agency, was investigating whether the Forest Service had retaliated against Ith. The case was closed when Ith died.
His widow, Marketa Ith, then sued the agency for her husband's records. Many of her husband's personnel files showed his superiors' discomfort with his criticism and their discussions of whether and how to remove him.
Forest Service Employees for Environmental Ethics, a nonprofit that joined Glen Ith in his Tongass appeals, is helping his widow in her case.
In checking the document logs, Marketa Ith's attorneys determined the agency had not produced some documents it said it had given her. One document referred to another that wasn't on the agency's log at all. Some of the documents contained instructions to destroy correspondence about Ith so it couldn't be used against the agency in court.
The agency produced more documents and says there aren't any more.
Ith asked Sedwick to make the Forest Service swear under oath that it had produced all the documents and describe its search for them.
Sedwick ordered the agency to do so by June 30.
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