Ed Paskovskis, deputy director at the Port of Everett, will step down at the end of the year after a 22-year career with the agency. At Tuesday’s port commission meeting, Paskovskis announced his resignation at the end of the year, saying it was time for a change. “My years at the port have been an outstanding time of personal and professional growth, and it has been my honor to work alongside an exceptional group of port professionals,” Paskovskis said. In recent years, Paskovskis worked on several key projects, including taking over the federal fuel depot on Mukilteo’s waterfront from the Air Force.
Quarterly profits strong for Toyota
Toyota said Tuesday its net profit surged 34 percent in the July-September quarter, boosted by strong sales in the North American and European markets at a time its U.S. rivals are struggling. The Japanese automaker, on pace to overtake General Motors as the world’s biggest automaker in coming years, also raised its profit forecast for the full fiscal year through March to 1.55 trillion yen ($13.14 billion), up from an earlier 1.31 trillion yen.
Airbus told to pay crash damages
A French court ruled Tuesday that aircraft manufacturer Airbus and carrier Air France are liable to pay damages for a 1992 plane crash that killed 87 people near the German border. The court in the northeastern city of Colmar acquitted six defendants who faced criminal charges in the case. Without saying why, it pinned responsibility on Airbus, which manufactured the crashed airliner, and Air France, which absorbed the now-defunct domestic carrier, Air Inter. An amount for damages has yet to be determined.
Consumer loans fall, including autos
Consumer borrowing fell in September by the largest amount since the recession of the early 1990s, weakened by a huge drop in auto loans. The Federal Reserve reported Tuesday that borrowing declined at an annual rate of 0.6 percent in September, compared with a 4.6 percent rate of increase in August. Borrowing fell by $1.2 billion in September – the biggest drop since a $1.78 billion decrease in April 1992.
Court OKs Lay conviction ruling
A federal appeals court has upheld a judge’s ruling to vacate the conviction of Enron Corp.’s late founder, Kenneth Lay, who had been found guilty earlier this year of committing fraud and conspiracy in one of the biggest corporate scandals in U.S. history. The challenge to the ruling by U.S. District Judge Sim Lake came from Russell Butler, an Enron shareholder who lost $8,000 in the company’s collapse. Butler, a Maryland crime victims attorney, had asked Lake for an order of restitution based on Lay’s conviction. Lake ruled he was bound by previous court rulings, which stated that a defendant’s death extinguished his entire case because he hadn’t had a full opportunity to challenge the conviction.
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