An Army appeals court on Friday declined to order that gruesome Afghan corpse photographs taken by Washington state-based soldiers be made public.

Pfc. Andrew Holmes, of Boise, Idaho, is one of five soldiers at Joint Base Lewis-McChord charged in the deaths of three civilians in Kandahar Province last year. He filed a petition asking the Army Court of Criminal Appeals to allow him to present the sensitive photographs during a preliminary hearing in his case.

In an unusual move, the Virginia court halted Holmes' prosecution in November while it considered arguments made by his attorney, Army lawyers and the nonprofit National Institute of Military Justice, which sided with Holmes. The court issued a two-sentence order Friday denying the petition and ordering the stay of his case lifted.