South Dakotans Seek $400K For Disabled Gold Mines

In August 2006, Forest Service workers bulldozed the trenches and shafts on one mine, making it inaccessible, the lawsuit states.

Around October 2006, agency workers installed a locked gate over the tunnel entrance to one of the other mines, blocking access to it, the lawsuit states.

The Marstons said they found out about the changes after returning to the mines in May 2007. Their lawsuit says they never agreed to the closures or were notified of them and accuses the government and its officials of trespassing, negligence and violating the General Mining Law of 1872.

"They bulldozed the shaft, the trenches and basically rendered the claims unusable," said their attorney, Joel Spector of Mountain States Legal Foundation in Lakewood, Colo. "That was more than just preventing the public from getting hurt on those claims. It actually destroyed the Marstons' ability to use the claims at all."