Valdez

Ismael Valdez made a small adjustment to his motion, and it made all the difference. He pitched seven strong innings for his first victory in more than a month, leading the San Diego Padres over the Brewers, 5-2, Sunday at Milwaukee. "I kept the ball down, and my pitches were working a lot better. My body was going toward first base instead of toward home plate," Valdez said, adding that he also moved to the left side of the rubber to help his balance.

A federal judge Wednesday ordered Exxon Mobil Corp. to pay about $6.75 billion to thousands of Alaskans affected by the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill. The ruling is the latest of several damage awards in the case over the last decade -- the result of successful appeals in federal court by Exxon. The company plans to appeal again. The ruling by U.S. District Judge H. Russel Holland ordered Exxon, based in Irving, Texas, to pay $4.5 billion in punitive damages and about $2.25 billion in interest.

Hidden pools of oil left over from the Exxon Valdez spill 14 years ago continued to damage the Alaskan coastal environment for a decade, killing pink salmon eggs and retarding the population growth of sea otters, harlequin ducks and other wildlife, a new study says.

I went to Albuquerque in February for the "Chicano Visions" opening at the National Hispanic Cultural Center of New Mexico. Then I stayed in New Mexico for four days. Usually I take a train there. You leave in the evening, have dinner on the train, go to bed, and in the morning, you're in Albuquerque. The hotel I stay at is La Posada de Albuquerque. From there I took the shuttle to Santa Fe. I stay at the Hotel Santa Fe. It's partially owned by Native Americans.

A federal judge Friday reduced by $1 billion the damage award against Exxon Mobil Corp. for spilling 11 million gallons of crude oil into Prince William Sound 13 years ago. U.S. District Judge Russel Holland reduced the original $5-billion punitive damages award to $4 billion. An Alaska jury in 1994 approved the original award in the Exxon Valdez spill, but the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals found it excessive and sent the case back to Holland. Exxon Mobil says it will appeal the new figure.

A damaged oil tanker broke in two off the craggy northwest coast of Spain and sank Tuesday, threatening an environmental disaster from a spill twice as large as the one from the Exxon Valdez in 1989. The single-hull Prestige was carrying intermediate-grade fuel oil, which is less toxic than crude oil but so thick that it can smother birds and marine mammals with a tar-like goop. The ship ruptured last Wednesday during a storm, sustaining a 40-foot-long crack in the hull below the waterline.

ALASKA * Thirteen years after the Exxon Valdez fouled Prince William Sound with crude oil, former tanker Capt. Joe Hazelwood has finished paying his official debt to Alaska with a $50,000 check. In 1990, a jury convicted Hazelwood of negligent discharge of oil, a misdemeanor. His sentence also included 1,000 hours of community service, which he completed last summer.

Mike Angaiak crouches on his knees on the rocky beach at Snug Harbor, scraping the bottom of a sandy pit with a trowel. Finding nothing, he refills the pit with gray sand and rocks and moves on to a spot about six feet away. Angaiak tosses aside rocks and boulders and starts to dig another hole. But this time, the sand beneath the rocks is deep brown and oily. "Ugh," he says as he lifts an oiled rock from the freshly dug hole and sniffs it. "You can smell it."

Director Luis Valdez watched his actors intently Wednesday night from a seat overlooking a small, curved stage at the Skirball Cultural Center in Brentwood. The stocky Chicano playwright sat behind a recording console as his 16-member troupe worked through the opening night of a novel new production of "Zoot Suit," the play that put Chicano theater on the map 23 years ago and made its creator famous. Valdez was dressed in black jeans and T-shirt.