Posted on 07/28/2007 5:57:47 AM PDT by John Jorsett
Just before the case went to the jury, Conrad Black's two lead attorneys sent him a demand for an additional million bucks each. No messing around with billable hours and 15-minute increments and $27.59 for photocopying: just a nice round seven-figure sum by way of supplementary retainer.
A day or two before closing arguments to the 12 men and women who'll decide your fate is no time to pick a quarrel with your lawyers. Or, at any rate, yet another quarrel to add to those you're already having, and they're having with each other, and the American lawyer's associates are having with the Canadian lawyer, and the Canadian lawyer is having with his own associates, and your wife is having with all of them. So Conrad paid up. After all, what's another seven-figure sum here or there? In the Hollinger meltdown, it's chump change in the scheme of things: what's left of Lord Black's former company has sluiced a nine-figure sum to its legal "advisers," and, back in the good old days when Richard Breeden was penning lurid reports on Hollinger's "corporate kleptocracy", the fallen media baron was accused of looting the best part of half a 10-figure sum. In the end, after four years, he was found guilty of stealing $2.9 million -- or about what he's spent on lawyers this last month, and a fraction of what the taxpayers of the United States have paid up in order to nail him.
(Excerpt) Read more at macleans.ca ...
made it thru 3 pages of it.....I like Steyns style a lot, but....
—good article, if long. Should be read by those who think that “justice” or “truth” is served in trials receiving a lot of publicity-—
An important read; thank you for posting the article, John.
I read Steyn’s colunns on this occasionally during the trial and his take was uniform throughout: This was an over-drawn criminal indictment and prosecution that turned into a long rather boring showtrial for the lawyers.
He didn’t make enough lawyer jokes. eg. Why don’t sharks eat lawyers? Professional courtesy.
Couldn’t agree more!
Conrad Black pillaged shareholders for years and years. He was good at buying friends and members of his boards (like Kissinger) and now many of them are repaying the debt.
I hope he stews in jail for a long time!
My version says "because they don't eat their young.
Apparently you’re stewing somewhere, having at some point been banned....friend of Fitz, perhaps?
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