The photo above, taken in 2006, shows the unusual contraband: the fur-clad bodies of 126 beaver, 12 muskrat, a mink, and an otter. Officers with the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources seized the animals as part of its investigation into Timothy L. Kresel, a trapper who lived in Brooklyn Park. Kresel’s methods of capturing fur-bearing creatures in the wild got him into significant trouble with the agency that enforces trapping laws.

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I spoke too soon when I wrote that Jim Martin, the victim of a car transaction in which the dealership disappeared, could finally prove ownership of his truck. It turns out the title that he had received after months of effort wasn’t accepted by the Wisconsin Division of Motor Vehicles because someone had written on the back of it conveying the title to Maryland Avenue Auto Sales, the defunct dealer.

“I have a worthless title,” Martin told me with chagrin Friday. In Minnesota, a court order to get a new title could cost $200 to $250, but Martin hopes the finance company’s lawyer can work it out. Nevertheless, after a brief moment of hope for real license plates, he’s back in limbo, six months after he bought the truck, unable to prove that it’s his.

Last week, the Minnesota Board of Dentistry suspended the license of Gwendolyn Timberlake. The St. Paul dentist has been a focus of complaints and disciplinary action since 2000, according to the board’s most recent summary of Timberlake’s record. But until she got delinquent on her taxes, the state let her keep practicing dentistry.

“On a personal level, I can tell you that this is a very sad case of a licensee who got into a difficult situation, was provided numerous opportunities to remediate the problems, and has been unable to do so despite escalating Board action,” Marshall Shragg, the board’s executive director, wrote me in an email.

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Now that the U.S. Supreme Court has cut the punitive damages owed by ExxonMobil for the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska - from $2.5 billion to $500 million - it’s instructive to look at some of the statistics about the world’s second largest - and most profitable - corporation.

Last year, ExxonMobil made a record $40 billion profit. Total sales in 2007 reached $390 billion, up from $237 billion in 2003. In 2005, ExxonMobil became the first company ever to post $100 billion in quarterly sales.

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