Conrad Black Released From US Prison

A US official says former media mogul Conrad Black is back in Canada after being released from prison.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokesman Nestor Yglesias said further details about Black's arrival, including his location, will be released later.

The 67-year-old, whose empire once included the Daily Telegraph, was freed from a federal prison in Miami in Florida after serving three years for defrauding investors.

But the tycoon, who once sat in House of Lords as Lord Black of Crossharbour, now faces deportation, just like any other non-US citizen released from jail.

Black is British, having renounced his Canadian citizenship to take his seat in the Lords, but the country of his birth has controversially offered him a one-year residency permit.

He was sentenced to more than six years in prison after his conviction for fraud and obstruction of justice at a high-profile trial in Chicago in 2007.

Prosecutors said Black received millions of dollars in payments from companies who had bought newspapers from his Hollinger International group, in return for promises that he would not compete against them.

It was alleged he and other executives pocketed the money, which should have gone to shareholders, without telling Hollinger's board of directors.

Black was released two years into his sentence to pursue an appeal that was partially successful.

A judge reduced his sentence to three years and he returned to prison last September.

Black was known for a grand lifestyle, including a $62,000 birthday party for his wife Barbara Amiel, a swanky apartment on Park Avenue in New York and sometimes haughty comments during his trial.

It has been reported that, while in prison, he has learned to play the piano and several fellow inmates have said he changed their lives through lectures he gave on writing, history, economics and other subjects.

Black, who has also written a number of books while in custody, has won the right to continue a libel claim against officials and executives in the United States.

It has been reported he plans to live in Toronto, where he and his wife have a home, but his potential return has been condemned by Canadian politicians.