CINCINNATI, Ohio -- A federal appeals court on Wednesday revived a lawsuit filed by the family of an unarmed bank robbery suspect shot and killed by a Cleveland police officer.

The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, in a 2-1 decision, wrote that there are factual disputes about the actions Detective Daniel Zola and two other officers took before Zola shot Danny Withers in the chest.

The factual dispute raises questions about Zola's defense that he made a "split-second decision" in the September 2010 shooting.

The decision means the lawsuit, first filed against the city and officers in 2011 and dismissed by a trial judge last year, will be sent back to the federal court in Cleveland for a trial. The decision also revives the possibility that Zola could be held liable for civil damages.

(To read the full decision, click here or scroll to the bottom of the story.)

Zola and officers David Shapiro and Thomas Shoulders served an arrest warrant at the East 125th Street home of Withers' grandmother. Withers, 21, who was in a closet in a dimly-lit basement, was shot as he quickly raised his right hand after Shoulders opened the closet, court records say.

Withers was wanted in a bank robbery where he threatened a teller with "blowing her head off" if she gave him a dye pack with the money he took.

The dispute raised in the appeal concerns how much time elapsed before Zola fired.

Zola said that he made a the decision to shoot in "[l]ess than a split second." A neighbor indicated in a sworn statement that he heard Zola tell his supervisor that he told Withers to "get down, f---er, get down f---er" before the shooting.

The appeals decision authored by Judge Gilbert Merritt Jr. says that U.S. District Judge Christopher Boyko, the Cleveland judge who presided over the initial case, "improperly disregarded the factual disputes."

Merritt wrote, "Zola could not have possibly identified a body, shouted the obscenity, and then shot Withers--all in '[l]ess than a split second.'"

The court also noted that Zola, during a deposition, said that he and his fellow officers repeatedly shouted for Withers to show his hands.

"This command casts doubt on the reasonableness of Zola's use of deadly force because a reasonable officer could certainly expect a suspect to make gestures with his arms and hands consistent with the lawful order to 'show us your hands' given only moments earlier," the decision reads.

Larry Zukerman, an attorney representing Withers' family, said the family is relieved and is looking forward to their day in court.

"An unarmed black man shouldn't be shot in the basement of their grandmother's house," Zukerman said.

The city of Cleveland said in a statement that it received the decision and is contemplating its next move.

While police did not find a gun at the scene, they said a screwdriver was found near where Withers was shot.

Judge Richard Griffin, in a dissent, wrote that he agreed with Boyko's decision.

"Given the totality of the circumstances confronting Zola at that moment, his decision to fire his weapon, while tragic in hindsight, was objectively reasonable at the time he decided to exercise force," Griffin wrote.

"Split-second decisions" also played heavily into Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Timothy J. McGinty's recommendation against filing charges against the officers in the Tamir Rice shooting.

McGinty, for his recommendation,

that said that judges must only rely on the immediate decision to fire, and not the actions in the minutes and seconds leading up to it.