SALT LAKE CITY – American Skiing Co. is seeking the protection of the Utah courts against a threatened eviction at its flagship The Canyons resort in Park City.

The company, which owns Sugarloaf USA and Sunday River ski resorts in Maine, has obtained a temporary injunction blocking eviction and is asking a judge to declare it has done nothing to violate terms of a lease covering the center of the ski area. The 3,500-acre The Canyons resort, Utah’s largest, is made up of a patchwork of private leases and state lands.

Third District Judge Bruce Lubeck issued the injunction blocking Kenny Griswold from taking action to evict American Skiing Co. from 550 acres at the heart of The Canyons, where a gondola deposits skiers at a mid-mountain lodge and chair lifts going higher up the mountain.

Griswold operated the former Wolf Mountain ski area with a partner and still owns some of the land that makes up the new resort. He controls much of the resort lands through leases he cobbled together from a collection of private owners.

Lubeck ruled that Griswold’s threat could have destroyed The Canyons, where Vice President Tim Vetter said American Skiing Co. spent $60 million after the 1997 takeover of tiny Wolf Mountain and is adding another $10 million in improvements this year.

The judge said a notice of lease termination could have thrown doubt on season pass sales at The Canyons for the coming winter, disrupted construction of a golf course and prompted American Skiing’s creditors to call in their debts or refuse to lend more money.

“In fact, preserving the status quo in this case protects the substantial public interest in The Canyons development,” Lubeck wrote in a three-page order signed Friday.

“The Canyons is an important commercial enterprise within the Park City area that provides many benefits to the employees that work there, the owners and developers of land in and around The Canyons and to the public at large,” Lubeck said.

Griswold served a “notice of default” March 31 on Park City-based American Skiing and threatened to follow up with eviction. He contends that Les Otten, the founder of American Skiing and its former president and CEO, went behind his back in the late 1990s to change terms of a lease Griswold worked out with a family that owns the heart of The Canyons’ property.

Griswold’s attorney, Jesse Trentadue, said the changes violate terms of a master lease Griswold arranged for the new resort and that American Skiing officials signed side deals claiming to be principals of Wolf Mountain Resorts LLC, a company they don’t control.

Vetter denied that the documents had that effect and said American Skiing was asking the judge to make his own interpretation.

The company obtained “additional rights” in negotiations with the Osguthorpe family, owner of the key resort parcel, “as part of fulfilling the master plan and creating a world class resort,” Vetter said.