On a Friday-going-on-Saturday when the Carlos Fierro trial dominated local headlines, the company that was Thornburg Mortgage announced that its founder, H Garrett Thornburg, Jr, was stepping down as board chairman. Journal North editor Mark Oswald had the story, which you can't read unless you subscribe to that paper.

As Oswald noted rather slyly, the news came in a "release issued by a New York public relations firm."

Why resign now? Thornburg cited "shocking allegations" against former executives he'd worked with closely for years. It's unclear how significant this move is, because Thornburg remains in charge of Thornburg Mortgage Advisory Corporation, a legal entity that technically employs the other company's executives.

In the late Thornburg Mortgage's ongoing bankruptcy proceedings, Reuters reported yesterday the company opposes its creditors' motion to have an independent manager take over while the company is dismantled. Thornburg says it's "superfluous, not to mention an unnecessary and unwarranted expenditure of time and resources," according to Reuters. A representative creditor, however, is "been particularly concerned that its cash collateral might be used to finance the unnecessarily high operating costs of this estate."