Associated Press - November 27, 2009 8:05 AM ET

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) - A federal judge has dismissed portions of lawsuits brought by four people who spent decades behind bars for a murder that DNA evidence proved they didn't commit.

But U.S. District Court Judge Richard Kopf's ruling this week will allow the suits against Gage County and officials tied to the initial murder investigation to continue.

DNA testing conducted last year cleared JoAnn Taylor, Thomas Winslow, Kathy Gonzalez and James Dean and two others of a Beatrice murder. The evidence identified another man as the sole killer.

The four allege that investigators and the former county attorney manufactured evidence and coerced them into confessing to the murder.

They are the first people in Nebraska to be exonerated of murder through DNA testing.

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