A federal appeals court in Atlanta has paved the way for a trial centered on claims that former DeKalb County CEO Vernon Jones and his staff engaged in blatant discrimination against white county managers.

“In 2001, DeKalb County, Georgia embarked on a wholesale plan to replace its white county managers with African-Americans,” Judge Gerald R. Tjoflat of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals wrote in an unusually blunt introduction to a 55-page decision.