NEW YORK — A federal judge has held three defendants in contempt for violating a preliminary injunction that barred them from selling unstamped cigarettes to nonmembers of the Unkechauge Nation in New York state.

U.S. District Judge Carol Amon found that three of the 11 individual defendants in a civil claim filed by the City of New York have continued to sell cigarettes despite an August 2009 order barring them from such sales other than to tribe members for their personal use.