Conrad Black

Conrad Black

Conrad Moffat Black, Baron Black of Crossharbour, PC, OC, KCSG (born August 25, 1944) is a Canadian-born member of the House of Lords, a convicted felon, a historian, a columnist and publisher, who was for a time the third-largest newspaper magnate in the world. Lord Black controlled Hollinger International, Inc. Through affiliates, the company published major newspapers including The Daily Telegraph (UK), Chicago Sun Times (U.S.), The Jerusalem Post (Israel), National Post (Canada), The Sydney Morning Herald (Australia), and hundreds of community newspapers in North America.

Black is also an author, having written two memoirs (A Life in Progress and A Matter of Principle) and biographies of Maurice Duplessis, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and Richard Nixon. He writes a regular column for Canada’s National Post and contributes to The American Spectator, National Review Online, The Huffington Post and The Catholic Herald.

Beginning in 2004, Black was the subject of a highly publicized prosecution in the United States. Black has publicly maintained his innocence since the original indictment. He was convicted of three counts of fraud and one count of obstruction of justice in a U.S. court in 2007 and sentenced to six and a half years' imprisonment. Two of the charges were overturned on appeal and in 2011 he was resentenced on the one remaining count of mail fraud and on the one count of obstruction of justice to a prison term of 42 months and a fine of US$125,000. Black was released on May 4, 2012.