Black’s lawyers say convicted felon should be set free

Lawyers for Conrad Black urged a U.S. judge to set the convicted felon free in a re-sentencing hearing Friday in Chicago.

Black’s legal team argued that he should walk free with time already served in prison.

They urged Justice Amy St. Eve to free Black based on his age and good behaviour at a Florida prison in which he spent 29 months before being released on an appeal ruling last year.

They also noted the lesser sentence served by his co-defendants convicted along with Black nearly four years ago.

Black’s lawyers told the court there is no reasonable explanation for him to have such a longer sentence.

One lawyer, Carolyn Gurland, said Black’s efforts as an educator at the prison in Coleman, Fla.”were nothing less than extraordinary” and that he maintained a positive attitude “despite the enormity of the suffering that he endured.”

Lawyer Miguel Estrada said Black faced daily degradation with grace at the central Florida prison, which largely houses violent criminals and drug offenders.

” It is not typical of what people found guilty of this sort of crime have to endure,” he told St. Eve.

The defence also hinted that Black’s health is declining and prison is not a place for a 66 year old.

Earlier, defence lawyers and prosecutors sparred over a pre-sentencing report being reviewed by St. Eve, the same judge who sentenced Black to prison after a conviction on fraud and obstruction of justice charges four years ago.

Black, dressed in a navy blue suit with a red tie, sat with his lawyers. His wife, Barbara Amiel, appearing gaunt in white, sat in the front row behind him.

St. Eve told the lawyers she will use a baseline sentencing guidance of 51 to 63 months using 2000 legal guidelines.

She said that guideline is a framework that can be changed based on other factors like good behaviour and acceptance of responsibility.

St. Eves overruled a government objection to a pre-sentencing report that argued the two fraud charges against Black reversed by a higher court should still be factored in to any sentencing.

But she sided with prosecutors on three objections that the standing fraud count is serious enough to warrant sentencing enhancements.

St. Eve said the fact that Black knowingly concealed his crime makes it more serious.

“He had money diverted for himself …and abused the trust of shareholders for taking the money that belonged to them.”

The hearing could leave Black free or send him back to prison and may be the final chapter of his decade-long American legal saga.

But it’s one that, if he is freed, the prolific author will be forced to write outside the United States.

The Montreal-born Black has been free on bail for about a year after an appeals court reversed two of Black’s three fraud convictions, leaving St. Eve to handle the resentencing.

She has three options: allow the 66-year-old to stay free based on time already served, uphold his original sentence, or send him back to jail on a reduced sentence.

if Black emerges a free man, he remains a convicted felon — with a presidential pardon his only recourse to clear his name — who will be targeted for immediate deportation.

“He’s a convicted felon, he’s no longer welcome in the United States,” said Jacob Frenkel, a former U.S. prosecutor and frequent commentator on the Black case.

“I think it’s reasonable to expect that he will stroll out of there. But more likely he’s strolling to the airport to his next country of domicile — not strolling to take in a Broadway play.”

Black was freed last July on a $2 million bond, with the stipulation that he remain in the U.S. until the appeal process concluded. He has since pursued virtually every appeal avenue.

After a Supreme Court rejection to rehear his case in May, it was clear he had exhausted every possible recourse — and resentencing was imminent.

If Black is allowed to stay free with his ailing, yet still stylish, wife Barbara Amiel, 70, it’s unclear where they’ll call home.

Black is a British citizen who renounced his Canadian citizenship for a peerage in British House of Lords. Usually, a criminal is accepted back into his country of citizenship, but Black has expressly stated that he wants to return to Toronto, where he built his fortune.

But first, Black — whose empire once included the Chicago Sun-Times, The Daily Telegraph of London and small papers across the U.S. and Canada — must focus on securing his liberty, said Steven Skurka, a Canadian criminal lawyer who wrote a book on Black’s case.

Black’s age, the 2 1/2 years he’s already served, the recommendation of a probation report — which suggested a minimum sentence of time served — the lesser amount of time his co-defendants spent in jail, and his good behaviour in jail are all reasons that Black should walk away, he said.

“And also — just bringing this case to an end.”

A glimmer of hope cracked open in Black’s relentless pursuit to clear his name last June. The U.S. Supreme Court made a landmark ruling that found a number of flaws in the “honest services” statute used to convict him of siphoning $6.1 million when he was CEO of Hollinger International Inc.

His fraud charges were sent to a lower court for re-examination, but the more serious obstruction of justice charge — laid after jurors saw a video of the mogul carrying boxes out of his Toronto office — was not affected by the high court’s decision.

The remaining fraud conviction, the judges found, involved Black and others taking $600,000 and had nothing to do with honest services: It was, they concluded, straightforward theft.

Those convictions alone are extremely serious and enough to warrant a 6 1/2 year sentence, said Chicago lawyer Andrew Stoltmann, who believes there’s less than a five per cent chance Black will walk.

“Mr. Black has been his own worse enemy and I think it is highly unlikely the sentence gets reduced.”