A pardon for Conrad Black
Trump makes amends for an unjust fraud prosecution
President Donald Trump pardoned Conrad Black last week, and congratulations are in order for both men. Mr. Trump was willing to defy liberal elites to correct an injustice, while Lord Black can live out his days free from the stigma of a prosecution that should never have been brought.
The media, in its blinkered way, is portraying the act of executive clemency as a political favor to a conservative friend “who wrote [a] glowing Trump biography last year,” as NPR put it. These cynics should study Lord Black’s case.
The former media mogul was
prosecuted for “honest services” fraud and obstruction of justice by Patrick Fitzgerald, who had also railroaded Scooter Libby. A Chicago jury acquitted Lord Black on nine of 13 charges, and a unanimous Supreme Court vacated the other four in 2010 as part of its landmark ruling that the honest-services statute was unconstitutionally vague and an invitation to abuse.
A judge reinstated one of the fraud counts, which also allowed a count of obstruction of justice to be upheld. The fraud count concerned a transfer of money that had been approved by independent directors but not formally approved by the company secretary. The obstruction charge concerned an alleged removal of papers that already had been turned over to the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Our regret is that we didn’t appreciate the abuse of “honest services” soon enough to campaign against it before Lord Black’s conviction. We should have been warned by the role of Mr. Fitzgerald, a close friend of James Comey, the former FBI director who as a prosecutor was also known for wrongfully targeting politically unpopular figures like investment banker Frank Quattrone.
Lord Black spent more than three years in federal prison, where he tutored fellow prisoners, wrote admirable books and comported himself with remarkable dignity under the circumstances. Conrad Black deserves his pardon, and Mr. Trump was right to use his power under the Constitution to grant it.