Notice the following News story...Simply says AP That means (Associated Press.) You will also Notice that no where in the story does it give an Author credit. You are free to reproduce this anywhere you like as long as it is not for profit such as a newspaper. This is where they get most of their non local stories.
You can subscribe for a small fee. I should further point out that AP and UP are mostly North American and the I on the end is International News. eg. United press International
WILMINGTON, Del. (AP) — Conrad Black, the embattled newspaper tycoon, struck back at his board of directors Feb. 20, testifying that he was railroaded into stepping down as CEO of his publishing empire and agreeing to return payments he received from the company.
In the third and last day of testimony, Black said he wasn't given enough time to respond to charges from a special committee of the board of Hollinger International Inc. that he and other top executives improperly received about $16 million in payments that hadn't been authorized.
Black said he was confronted with the allegations Nov. 6 and given just four days to respond. He met the deadline but told the court he felt he didn't have enough time to answer the charges fully.
"I was not in a position to refute their findings, and I trusted them," Black said of the board members who made the accusations against him. Saying they had threatened him with "draconian" measures if he didn't cooperate, Black said: "In the circumstances, I negotiated the best deal I could."
Black and his lawyers are arguing that enough other evidence has come to light since then to suggest the payments may well have received the proper approval from the board. Black has reversed his promise to repay the $7 million and wants to be reinstated as CEO.
The payments Black and others received were purportedly for "non-compete" agreements connected with the sale of some of the company's newspapers. Those agreements guarantee a buyer of a newspaper that the seller will not immediately re-enter the same market.
But unhappy shareholders in Hollinger International have complained that the payments should have gone to the company, and not to Black and the other individuals.
Under questioning by a lawyer for the board, Black testified that he was "not sure" if he had actually signed a non-compete agreement in at least one of the cases in which he received a payment.
Black, who was visibly flustered at the questions, also admitted to signing a non-compete agreement with one of his company's own subsidiaries.
Black is facing accusations that he secretly reached a deal with the Barclay brothers of Britain to sell control of the company out from under his own board, undermining a separate sale process that he had promised to support. The board contends that the secret deal benefits Black, the controlling shareholder, at the expense of other shareholders.
Black said Feb. 20 he made that deal because his board of directors were intent on inflicting the "maximum amount of economic damage possible on the controlling shareholder," namely, him.
The outcome of the case may well determine the fate of Hollinger International's newspapers, which include The Daily Telegraph of London, the Chicago Sun-Times and The Jerusalem Post.
The day before Black testified, a legal adviser to the investigators looking into the payments told the court that Black had frequently threatened the members of the special committee with legal action or removal from the board.
Richard Breeden, a former chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, said he couldn't remember how many times Black had made such threats. "Mr. Black begins many conversations by threatening everybody," Breeden said.
Breeden also said he believed Black would "get out of Dodge" if a deal that he negotiated with the Barclays went through, placing the money in an overseas bank where investigators seeking to recover the money would have little chance.
During Black's testimony Feb. 20, his penchant for flowery language was on full display. In several references to amounts of money, he used the Latin term "quantum" instead of "amount," people he was speaking with as "interlocutors."
Black was in the middle of a tour to promote his 1,280-page biography of Franklin Delano Roosevelt last fall when the financial scandal erupted. The book has received glowing reviews.
Black also said he was concerned about the effects the accusations against him were having on his image. "I've been stigmatized as an embezzler," he said. "I'm trying to retrieve my reputation as an honest man."
The case is being tried in Chancery Court in Delaware, where Hollinger International and many other U.S. companies have their legal home.
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