(AP) — A federal judge has allowed lawyers representing six people wrongly convicted in a 1985 Nebraska murder to go ahead with an appeal of his decision to dismiss Gage County from the six’s wrongful prosecution lawsuit.

Such appeals are usually allowed only after a final decision has been reached in a lawsuit. But the lawsuit against three sheriff’s officials ended in January with a mistrial.

Lawyers for the six plan to try the case again. The six served a combined 77 years in prison before DNA testing exonerated them in 2008.

U.S. District Court Judge Richard Kopf said Monday it would be a waste of judicial resources to wait until the end of the second trial before appealing the dismissal of the county and others.