Having shot down the charges that he led a high-flying lifestyle at the expense of Hollinger, the company he controlled and which finally ousted him, and having being acquitted of a majority of the counts of the indictment, Lord Conrad Black has filed motions in the US District Court in Chicago asking his trial judge to either acquit him of the three counts of mail fraud and the one count of obstruction of justice of which he was convicted, or to order a new trial.
He is claiming that no rational jury should have found, beyond reasonable doubt, that the $2.8m (£1.4m) he received from Hollinger International in the form of non-compete payments was unauthorised or that he intended to obstruct justice when he removed boxes from his Toronto office in May 2005.
