AUSTIN — The prosecutors pursuing criminal charges against Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton have asked the state's highest court to overturn a recent ruling that voided their last paycheck.

In a 62-page writ filed Tuesday, the prosecutors argued the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals should vacate a decision by the 5th Court of Appeals in Dallas that cost them more than $205,000 in back pay.

The lower court's ruling, which said a local judge overstepped his authority in guaranteeing the prosecutors $300-an-hour for their work on the case, would have a "chilling effect" on the state's ability to find competent attorneys to investigate potential wrongdoing by the state's top elected officials, they argued.

"Left unchecked, the court of appeals' decision divesting trial judges of the discretion to control their dockets will have a chilling effect on their ability to appoint competent advocates willing to take on the most complex criminal cases," prosecutor Brian Wice wrote in his writ to the court.

Now, the criminal court must either agree to take up or reject the prosecutors' request. If it opts for the latter, the lower court's ruling will stand, and the prosecutors must decide whether to continue on the case without a guarantee they'll be paid or turn over their work to a new set of attorneys.

1 / 5Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton faces three felony charges of fraud for allegedly duping investors into buying stock in a technology company without disclosing he was being paid by the firm. (2015 File Photo/Staff) 2 / 5Surrounded by his wife and lawyers, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton speaks on Friday, Sept. 2, 2016, outside the federal courthouse in Sherman, Texas after his lawyers debated federal prosecutors over whether Paxton tricked people to invest in obsolete computers before becoming the state's chief lawyer(Avi Selk / Staff writer) 3 / 5Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and wife Angela wave to the crowd during the 2016 Texas Republican Convention at the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center in Dallas.(Vernon Bryant / Staff Photographer) 4 / 5Special prosecutors Nicole DeBorde, Brian Wice and Kent Schaffer leave the Collin County courthouse following a December 2015 pretrial motion hearing regarding felony fraud charges against Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton.(2015 File Photo / Jae S. Lee) 5 / 5Special prosecutors Brian Wice, left, and Kent Schaffer attended a pre-trial motion hearing in December in McKinney in the Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton criminal case. (Jae S. Lee/The Dallas Morning News)

Wice and two other criminal defense attorneys with practices in Houston — Kent Schaffer and Nicole DeBorde — were asked to take over the Paxton case after Collin County District Attorney Greg Willis recused himself. Paxton, who was indicted on securities fraud charges in July 2015, and Willis are longtime friends and business partners.

Taxpayers in Collin County, where Paxton has lived and worked for decades, are footing the bill for the prosecution. The three special prosecutors were last paid in January 2016, when they received $254,000 for their first several months work on the case.

But their latest invoice, which tops $205,000 for more than a year's worth of work, has not been paid. The members of the Collin County Commissioners Court filed suit against the prosecutors earlier this summer, refusing to pay the bill and claiming the prosecutors' hourly rates break local and state caps on attorneys fees.

The Dallas court agreed with the commissioners last month, stating that Collin County rules that allowed judges to set their own rates in extraordinary circumstances broke state laws requiring attorneys to be paid along a prescribed fee schedule. Since that ruling, county officials have also sought to claw back the prosecutors' first paycheck.

In his appeal Tuesday, Wice argued two-thirds of Texas counties give judges the discretion to deviate from county fee schedules "in some form." By ruling that Collin County's breaks state law, he wrote, then it would logically follow the rest would also be problematic.

"The court of appeals admitted that it was 'not surprising that many Texas counties' have schedules with the same 'unusual circumstances' language," Wice wrote. "That is a fatal flaw."

He added this decision "falls at the intersection of two equally-important precepts that form the backbone of the criminal justice system:" that lawyers are paid reasonable fees and that the trial court ensures that happens.

Paxton was indicted in July 2015 on two first-degree felony fraud charges and one third-degree charge of breaking state securities laws by not registering as an investment adviser representative. He's denied the charges and said they are part of a political witch hunt by members of his own party.

Paxton's first of two trials is scheduled to kick off in mid-December, the same month he's expected to formally announce his campaign for re-election.