Conrad Black released from Miami jail

GlobalPost

Disgraced media mogul and convicted felon Conrad Black has been released from jail in Miami after serving just over three years for defrauding investors.

The 67-year-old, whose Hollinger International media company once owned The Daily Telegraph, The Chicago Sun-Times, The Jerusalem Post and the Sydney Morning Herald, left prison early on Friday, according to the BBC.

A spokesman for the U.S. Federal Bureau of Prisons confirmed Black's release but could not comment on his current whereabouts, The Wall Street Journal reports.

More from GlobalPost: Canada crying foul with Conrad Black headed back

Earlier this week, Black received a one-year temporary residency permit to re-enter and live in Canada upon his release, the Globe and Mail reported, a decision that drew sharp criticism from opposition politicians given Black’s renunciation of his Canadian citizenship in 2001 to become a British lord.

In 2003, Hollinger shareholders accused Black and his associates in Chicago of running a $500-million “corporate kleptocracy,” and a Chicago court eventually convicted him of awarding himself $6 million in tax-free bonuses without board approval, the Toronto Star reports.

A judge sentenced him to 6 and a half years in prison in 2007, of which he served two years. He was freed briefly on $2 million bail while the courts considered his case and was re-sentenced last June to 42 months. He is being released after eight months due to good behaviour.

More from GlobalPost: Ex-media mogul Conrad Black to be freed Friday

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