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A federal appeals court on Tuesday upheld most of the criminal convictions against two associates of former Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey in the 2013 scandal over George Washington Bridge lane closings, one of the more bizarre events in the state’s political history.

But in a partial victory for the defense, the court cleared the two associates, Bill Baroni and Bridget Anne Kelly, of two of the seven counts they had been found guilty of in 2016. The decision sends their case back to the lower court in Newark and opens the chance that their prison sentences could be lessened.

Ms. Kelly, the former deputy chief of staff for New Jersey’s Office of Intergovernmental Affairs, was sentenced to 18 months in prison for her role in “Bridgegate,” as the incident came to be known. Mr. Baroni, the former deputy executive director of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, was sentenced to two years in prison. Both have been out on bail as their appeals continued.

Michael Critchley, a lawyer for Ms. Kelly, said in a statement that while her legal team was pleased some of the charges had been rejected, it was were disappointed that all of them had not and intended “to petition the United States Supreme Court to review this case.”