Parsing the Conrad Black indictment . . .
Number of the 60 pages in the indictment that contain references to the audit committee: 36.
Humiliating detail: About a third of the assets sold to CanWest were owned by Hollinger Canadian Newspapers, a limited partnership controlled by Hollinger International. Yet according to the indictment, the entire $51.8 million in noncompete payments was paid to the executives out of Hollinger International’s share of the proceeds and none out of Hollinger Canadian Newspapers’ share. Why? Allegedly “to avoid having to raise the issue of the non-competition payments with the [Hollinger Canadian Newspapers] Audit Committee, which [the defendants] feared would ask more questions than the International Audit Committee.” (Who but Radler could have told the prosecutors this?)
Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites »
Here’s an unaddressed mystery. Why didn’t the independent directors, who presumably remembered that they hadn’t negotiated the payments Black said they negotiated, ask him what was going on? Were they too giddy with praise to notice? Unmentioned in the indictment but noted in a scathing August 2004 report by a “special committee” of the Hollinger board was what Black went on to say: “In all of the circumstances, the independent directors felt this was the fair thing to do, and I must say, I agree. . . . You’re dealing with a best efforts attempt to accommodate to industry practice and do what’s equitable as determined by independent directors who are as a group quite a distinguished group.”
On November 20 New York Times public editor Byron Calame devoted his column to anonymous sources, which his paper is haunted by and can’t quite get right. As an example of the bumbling he cited a Times article on the United Nations that ran on August 2, when John Bolton was reporting in as the new American ambassador: “‘Most of the reforms sought by the United States are well on their way to completion,’ said a senior administration official, speaking anonymously to avoid undercutting the rationale for the Bolton appointment.”
News Bite
One of the most interesting benefits the Internet offers is the opportunity to grade the news. When I go to Yahoo to read about what just happened, I also find out what the public already thinks about it. The technology has a long way to go, but one day it might be possible to keep news the public has no interest in from happening in the first place.
