Lawsuits against a group of officials from the city of Flint in Michigan officials, which was hit by a water crisis in 2014, will move forward after the US Supreme Court denied a request from their attorneys to put them on hold as they pursued an appeal.

The lawyers argued that their clients should not face the lawsuits after a three-judge panel ruled in January the officials “created the Flint Water environmental disaster and then intentionally attempted to cover up their grievous decision".

Sonia Sotomayor, the Supreme Court justice who handles appeals from the Michigan region, denied the request on Friday.

The lawsuit stems from a liability case brought by Shari Guertin.

The Flint resident said water that had been contaminated with lead during the crisis led to injuries for she and her child. She said she and her daughter bathed in the water and drank from their pipes, resulting in the injuries they experienced.

In pictures: Flint water crisis Show all 10 1 /10 In pictures: Flint water crisis In pictures: Flint water crisis Anthony Fordham picks up bottled water from the Food Bank of Eastern Michigan to deliver to a school after elevated lead levels were found in the city's water in Flint Reuters In pictures: Flint water crisis Michigan National Guard Staff Sergeant William Phillips (L) assists a Flint resident with bottled water at a fire station in Flint Reuters In pictures: Flint water crisis Flint residents Arthur Woodson, left, and Tony Palladino Jr. protest the arrival of Flint native and filmmaker Michael Moore as Moore accuses Gov.Rick Snyder of poisoning Flint water during a rally outside of city hall in Flint AP In pictures: Flint water crisis Flint residents pick up bottled water and water filters at a fire station in Flint. Michigan National Guard members were set to arrive in Flint to join door-to-door efforts to distribute bottled water and other supplies to residents coping with the city's crisis over lead-contaminated drinking water Reuters In pictures: Flint water crisis Soldiers from the Michigan Army National Guard Flint prepare to give Flint residents bottled water at a fire station in Flint Getty Images In pictures: Flint water crisis Justin Roberson (L), age 6, of Flint, Michigan and Mychal Adams, age 1, of Flint wait on a stack of bottled water at a rally where the Rev. Jesse Jackson was speaking about about the water crises at the Heavenly Host Baptist Church in Flint Getty Images In pictures: Flint water crisis A man sits next to a stack of bottled water at the Heavenly Host Baptist Church in Flint 2016 Getty Images In pictures: Flint water crisis The top of a water tower is seen at the Flint Water Plant. President Barack Obama declared a state of emergency in Michigan and ordered federal aid to be used to help state and local response efforts to an area affected by contaminated water Reuters In pictures: Flint water crisis Rosie Wright, center, rallies with the crowd over Flint's water crisis in Ann Arbor, Michigan AP In pictures: Flint water crisis Rick Catherman participates in a rally around Flint's water crisis in Ann Arbor, Michigan AP

A federal judge initially declined to dismiss the case, leading to the first appeal and the three-judge panel ruling in January against them.

The decision has been left intact ever since the full Sixth Circuit declined to take the case in May, NBC News reported.

In a separate criminal case, prosecutors dropped all charged against the eight officials involved in the crisis on Thursday and pledged to start from scratch the investigation into one of the worst man-made environmental disasters in US history.

The decision came more than three years – and millions of dollars – after authorities began examining the roots of the scandal that left Flint’s water system tainted with lead.

Michigan Solicitor General Fadwa Hammoud, who took control of the investigation in January after the election of a new attorney general, said “all available evidence was not pursued” by the previous team of prosecutors.

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Officials took possession this week of “millions of documents and hundreds of new electronic devices, significantly expanding the scope of our investigation”.