SHEPPARD v. MAXWELL, WARDEN

(1) Whether a state may constitutionally prohibit an attorney from making statements to the press that he or she knows or reasonably should know will have a substantial likelihood of materially prejudicing an adjudicative proceeding and, if so, (2) whether the State Bar of Nevada properly applied the rule in this case.

Did a state trial judge, presiding over a widely publicized murder trial, violate the First Amendment when he entered an order which, as modified by the Nebraska Supreme Court, restrained petitioner newspaper, broadcasters, journalists, news media associations, and national newswire services from publishing or broadcasting accounts of confessions or admissions made by the accused to law enforcement officers or third parties, except members of the press, and other facts "strongly implicative" of the accused

Whether a publisher can be held for contempt for an out-of-court editorial statement concerning a pending criminal case. In a companion case: whether a labor leader was can be held in contempt based on a telegram he sent to the Secretary of Labor regarding a pending case.