RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — A federal judge plans to dismiss a two-year-old environmental crimes case against poultry processor House of Raeford Farms and one of its turkey processing plant managers, but is giving prosecutors a chance to revive it later.

U.S. Judge James Beaty in Winston-Salem said late last month he'll dismiss because prosecutors failed to bring it to a speedy trial. Beaty has not yet filed a written order, but his comments are noted in federal court records.

U.S. Justice Department spokesman Wyn Hornbuckle said the agency declined comment Monday. But prosecutors made clear previously that they won't drop the case accusing House of Raeford of violating federal clean water laws by flushing turkey remains into a municipal sewage treatment plant.

"The United States will seek re-indictment," prosecutors wrote in court filings. "The public maintains an interest in seeing the defendants brought to trial."

The company appealed as far as the U.S. Supreme Court in its fight against the charges. The high court in October denied the company's request to consider arguments that it can't be prosecuted because it's already paid nearly $1 million in pollution fines and shouldn't be punished twice.

Attorneys for the Rose Hill-based company and Raeford turkey processing plant manager Gregory Steenblock argued that the U.S. Justice Department should have pursued the two-year-old case within 70 days to comply with federal speedy-trial requirements.

Attorneys for the company and Steenblock declined comment Monday.

Prosecutors accused the company and Steenblock in 2009 of knowingly bypassing the plant's water treatment system 14 times in 2005 and 2006, which dumped turkey feathers, blood and internal organs into waterways.

Federal prosecutors said the company's Raeford processing plant couldn't handle the daily flow of 1 million gallons of wastewater and sent untreated water to the city's municipal sewage treatment works.

The bypasses and failure to report them violated an earlier agreement by House of Raeford to stop releasing untreated waste from the plant where more than 30,000 turkeys a day were processed, federal prosecutors said.

"Critical to the functioning of the Clean Water Act is enforcement against industrial users who are required to comply with permits and pretreat their waste to protect municipal wastewater treatment plants," prosecutors said last month, "to prevent pass-through of pollutants that plants do not treat."

The company said it completed a $1.4 million pretreatment facility in September 2006 that solved the problems.

Privately owned House of Raeford processes chickens and turkeys in eight plants in North Carolina, South Carolina and Louisiana.