MADELEINE BRAND, host:
Back now with DAY TO DAY. I'm Madeleine Brand.
A Canadian media tycoon, allegations of multimillion-dollar fraud and a hundred pair of highly fashionable shoes--what's the connection? Why, it's Conrad Black. He's officially Lord Black, a member of the British House of Lords. He's also the former newspaper publisher who has just been charged in the US with corporate theft. He denies all the allegations. Joining us from the "Marketplace" London bureau is Stephen Beard.
And, Stephen, tell us more about this intriguing story. Most importantly, what about those shoes?
STEPHEN BEARD ("Marketplace"): Yeah. Well, you could say that His Lordship tripped up by his wife's shoes. This was when he was running Hollinger International, which owned the Chicago Sun-Times and hundreds of other papers. His wife gave an interview to Vogue magazine in which she showed off her collection of more than a hundred pairs of Manolo Blahnik shoes and many other facets of her opulent lifestyle. She was quoted as saying, "I have an extravagance that knows no bounds." Well, that interview infuriated a shareholder in Hollinger. He started asking questions, and those questions led eventually to fraud charges.
BRAND: And so what exactly is Lord Black charged with?
BEARD: That he and other executives siphoned off more than $50 million of Hollinger assets. Black's been accused of abusing company perks, using a company jet for a private holiday, spending $60,000 company money on a party for his wife. The prosecutors allege that in total, Black and the others stole about $80 million from the company.
BRAND: 80 million. And he denies it all?
BEARD: Vehemently. In fact, he seems to regard them as an impertinence, these allegations. Here's Debbie Melnyk, who made a documentary about Black entitled "Citizen Black."
Ms. DEBBIE MELNYK (Documentarian): Conrad Black definitely thinks that he's done nothing wrong. And I think that even if he were to go to prison, in his own mind it would be as a prisoner of conscience and that, you know, he's a martyr. And he earns his shareholders money for quite a long time, so he could do whatever he wanted with his company.
BEARD: The papers here are actually full of stories about Black's grandeur. At a banquet in Buckingham Palace, he reportedly turned to Princess Anne and said, `These paintings are magnificent, much finer than those in the White House, where incidentally I dined yesterday.'
BRAND: So I imagine he's not getting another invitation either to the White House or the palace in the near future.
BEARD: No, certainly not the palace, no. However, he retains his seat in the House of Lords, which he was given because he owned a major British newspaper chain. That, he'll probably keep even if convicted. There's apparently no mechanism for expelling a peer. So that is one of the perks of newspaper proprietorship that His Lordship will probably retain.
Let me just finally mention what's coming up later today on "Marketplace." We'll be doing a preview of what to expect from President Bush's visit to China.
BRAND: Stephen Beard of public radio's daily business show "Marketplace." And "Marketplace" is produced by American Public Media.
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