Former Sun-Times publisher sentenced to 29 months in prison
F. David Radler, the onetime deputy to former media mogul Conrad Black and a key player in Black’s downfall, was sentenced to 29 months in prison and fined $250,000 today in federal court as part of his plea deal with the government.
Radler, 65, the former publisher of the Chicago Sun-Times, has already paid more than $61 million in restitution and expressed regret for his actions.
(Brian Jackson/Sun-Times)
“I made mistakes and they hurt me and my family and others,” Radler told U.S. District Court Judge Amy St. Eve during his sentencing hearing.
The judge agreed to the 29-month prison term in Radler’s plea agreement, even though she said she was initially surprised by the low sentence when Radler pleaded guilty in 2005, given the millions of dollars in fraud.
The millions of dollars he paid back went “a long way” toward the judge accepting the plea agreement, she said.
“You have breached your duty of loyalty, your duty of trust to the shareholders of Hollinger International,” St. Eve told Radler.
Radler was a key witness for the government at the trial of Black. Radler testified several days in May and told jurors how he helped loot Hollinger International, primarily through bogus non-competition agreements with the buyers of the company’s newspapers.
Black was convicted and sentenced to 6 1/2 years in prison.
As for Radler, the judge agreed to recommend he serve his time in Moshannon Valley Correctional Institution in Philipsburg, Pa., which has about 1,500 inmates. The final determination, though, is up to the U.S. Bureau of Prisons.
As part of his plea agreement, Radler is free to try to get transferred to a prison in his home country of Canada, and prosecutors have agreed not to object. In Canada, Radler could serve a significantly smaller portion of his sentence than in a U.S. prison because of Canadian prison rules.
Radler’s lawyer, Anton Valukas, a former U.S. Attorney for Chicago, said his client was relieved his stressful ordeal was over.
“He didn’t run from what took place. He tried to make amends,” Valukas said.
“This is the first day of the rest of his life.”