COTTAGE GROVE (AP) &045; The Cottage Grove police chief received about $107,000 as part of a resignation deal in which he agreed not to pursue future legal claims against the city, the St. Paul Pioneer Press reported.

The City Council approved the separation agreement with John Mickelson on Thursday.

&uot;It means John won’t pursue any remedies for anything,&uot; City Administrator Ryan Schroeder said Friday.

Under the agreement, the city paid about $65,000 to Mickelson’s retirement fund and about $42,000 to him directly, the newspaper reported.

Mickelson was scheduled to be the city’s on-call police supervisor the night of May 8, when his vehicle was found on its top in Lakeville with the motor running.

Lakeville police didn’t find him until 13 hours later. Mickelson said he left the scene to seek medical attention.

Freight train derails, blocks track

ESSEX, Mont. (AP) &045; Twenty-one cars of a freight train carrying corn and soybeans derailed near the southern border of Glacier National Park on Friday, blocking the tracks that carry Amtrak’s Empire Builder passenger train from Chicago to Seattle.

Amtrak passengers were being taken by bus between Havre and Whitefish. Melonas said officials hoped to have at least one of the tracks reopened by Saturday morning.

The train was headed from Willmar, Minn., to Kalama, Wash., when the cars derailed at Blacktail, near the town of Essex at the southern end of Glacier National Park.

No one was injured.

13 elk killed over fears of disease

COOK (AP) &045; Minnesota Department of Natural Resources crews shot and killed 13 escaped elk from a captive herd near this northeast Minnesota town because of concerns over chronic wasting disease.

It’s not clear whether the herd’s owner, who wasn’t immediately named, was unable or unwilling to retrieve them from the wild.

Escaped deer and elk can be shot if farmers fail to recover their animals within 24 hours because of fears that the disease &045; fatal to elk and deer but harmless to humans &045; could infect wild herds.