A northeast Nebraska county commissioner has won a court order blocking his recall election because of flaws in the petition.

A Wayne County judge ordered election officials to abandon the Nov. 20 recall for Kelvin Wurdeman.

The Norfolk Daily News reported the judge agreed with Wurdeman that petition paperwork used to gather signatures was flawed because it failed to state whether paid circulators were used.

The recall petition accused Wurdeman of removing dirt from a landowner’s field without permission and using it to address a nearby road problem. Wurdeman says he paid the landowner $150 for the dirt to resolve the issue.

In a separate case, Wurdeman was fined $1,000 for theft. Wurdeman pleaded no contest to charges accusing him of stealing a truckload of publicly