LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — Nebraska lawmakers have advanced a measure setting guidelines for pipeline companies to follow when they restore farmland and ranchland disturbed during construction.

Requirements under the Oil Pipeline Reclamation Act are intended to restore construction areas as close as reasonably possible to the condition, contour and vegetation that existed prior to construction.

Sen. Kate Sullivan of Cedar Rapids says her plan is based on reclamation rules in Montana and South Dakota and would not hinder pipeline construction in Nebraska.

It sets rules for pipeline companies to follow, but it would not supercede agreements made between a company and a landowner.

Grading, seeding and restoring active cropland are included in the measure, which Sullivan says will protect Nebraska landowners if a pipeline crosses their land.

FREMONT, Neb. (AP) — A Nebraska jury has rejected a man’s claim that a medical condition would have made it impossible for him to rape a sleeping teenager.

Joshua Keadle was found guilty Thursday of first-degree sexual assault of a minor. The 30-year-old who has been linked to the 2010 disappearance of a Peru State College student had claimed that erectile dysfunction would have kept him from raping the 15-year-old in Fremont in 2008.

The sexual assault happened in December 2008 at a residence hall at what was then Midland Lutheran College. Keadle will face up to 50 years in prison when he is sentenced.

Keadle remains a person of interest in the December 2010 disappearance of a Peru State College student, Tyler Thomas. No charges have been filed in that case.

BEATRICE, Neb. (AP) — A Gage County District Court judge has rejected motions by the state to dismiss the lawsuits of two people wrongly convicted in a 1985 Beatrice murder-rape case.

Judge Daniel Bryan said in his rulings Thursday that the lawsuits filed by two of the so-called Beatrice Six against the state can proceed.

Ada Joanna Taylor and James Dean sued the state for $500,000 each, saying they were wrongfully convicted in the rape and murder of Helen Wilson in February 1985. Four others also were convicted and sentenced to prison in the case. The six were pardoned in 2009 after DNA evidence exonerated them.

Beatrice radio station KWBE reports that Bryan acknowledged Taylor and Dean “have an uphill climb” to prove their cases, but that the cases should be heard.

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — Nebraska lawmakers have advanced a new state spending plan that includes an additional $41 million for child welfare services, disaster aid and other priorities.

The budget-adjustment bill won first-round approval Wednesday in the Legislature. The measure updates the state’s $7 billion, two-year budget that passed last year.

The proposal includes $24 million for child care subsidies, and $18.5 million to reduce the caseloads and address other problems within the state’s child welfare system.

It also would increase the reimbursement paid to doctors, hospitals and nursing homes that serve Medicaid patients. The partial rate increase would cost $9.6 million, to offset a rate cut that lawmakers approved last year.

The plan adds nearly $9 million to the governor’s emergency program to help cover a recent increase in natural disasters.